The Feeling Is Mutual
by Slim Shady
Summary: She truly hated him. He was her worst enemy. He was evil to the core. Most importantly, he confused her. And Hermione did not like being confused.' There's a fine line between love and hate, and with Hermione tutoring Malfoy... they just might cross it.
1. Ron, Malfoy, and Ferenzonaba

Hermione Granger couldn't wait for the new school year to start. It was 7th year, her last year. Thinking about what this year would be like was bittersweet- she was both excited and disappointed. It was her last year; she was excited about what she could learn, but sad thinking that she would never return to Hogwarts again. They would be full-grown witches and wizards, she realized, and off into a world without homework and teachers, and starting their own lives as adults.

Harry, Ron, and all her other 7th year friends would be grown up this year, possibly more mature. Maybe, she thought, she could have serious conversation with Harry and Ron, about our plans for the future. She thought about how they both wanted to be Aurors, and how they wanted her to be one with them. But Hermione wasn't sure she could follow them down that path…she felt as if she was destined to be something else, it seemed like her fate-

She snorted. She was thinking like Trelawney- she shivered at this. 'I've got to try to stay away a bit from Lavender and Parvati. Fate, yeah right!' Being a practical, sensible girl, she didn't believe in all the dreamy predictions of love and happiness that Lavender and Parvati giggled about incessantly. They believed that their one "Prince Charming" was out there somewhere, having been "Destined" for them at the birth of their girly, annoying, bodies. 'Don't forget about their brains filled with gossip and hot air', Hermione thought with a smile. She did like those two, but could only bear them for a few hours at a time.

She was thinking all this while her parents dropped her off at Platform 9 ¾ in their cramped blue car. Her mom was crying, and her dad looked sad, just like they did every year. Hermione hated to see them like this, but she had to go.

"Mom! Dad! It's not as if I'll be gone forever! I'll try to visit you during the vacations okay?" Hermione said this with a falsely bright smile. Her parents knew her smile wasn't real, because it didn't reach her eyes. Hermione always got very sad when she left, but she tried not to show it-it would make it harder for them. She hugged her parents tightly, promising to write every week, and then waved at them as they drove away. She waved until they were a tiny blue circle in the distance, kept on waving until they were a tiny blue speck, and waved until she could not see them at all.

Forcing herself to let the picture of her parents' sad faces out of her head, and chasing away the melancholy that seemed to engulf her after saying goodbye, Hermione instead focused on the task at hand-Getting through the barrier. Hermione pushed her trolley fast as she ran towards the barrier, still a tiny bit nervous, after all these years that she would crash into a solid brick wall. She made it through the wall and pulled her trolley over to the side to catch her breath. She looked around and smiled at the sight of many familiar faces. There was Angelina Johnson, talking to Alicia and Katie. Hermione saw Neville and his grandmother. It looked like he lost something again. And over to the right, she saw her two best friends, Harry and Ron, talking. 'I'd go over, but I'm too tired right now', Hermione thought. She watched them instead.

"So then Dudley said, 'I'm not afraid of you' and then I looked past him and said 'Hi Hagrid! Still got that pink umbrella?' Then Dudley squealed like a pig-mind you, he already is a pig, so he sounded like himself- and ran down the block. He knocked into his disgusting friends on their bikes, and he's so fat that he made them all fall. They fell into this puddle of muddy water, and Dudley hit his head on the sidewalk. So then he had to walk home covered in mud and with a bruise on his forehead! Of course, I got blamed and punished for this, but it was worth it just to see it!" Harry started laughing, and Ron started laughing too. Ron slapped Harry on the back, and Harry was so surprised he fell on the ground. They were silent for a moment. Then they looked at each other, and started laughing hysterically again.

'What was I thinking before? That they'd be more mature this year? Have a "serious" conversation?' Hermione rolled her eyes as she watched Harry and Ron act like fools- mind you they already are fools, so they acted like themselves. 'Honestly, Harry's still on the floor!' She pulled the trolley over to them.

"Hi guys," she said, giving them a huge smile. Harry jumped up at the sight of her.

"Hermione!" Harry and Ron screamed. They hugged her tightly.

"You…guys…are…SQUISHING me!" She tried to pull away, but they had a firm grip.

"Sorry Hermione!" they said, releasing her.

"So, what did you guys do this summer?" She asked. Ron raised his hand. "Ooh ooh, pick me, pick me! I did a lot of cool stuff!" He danced around, waving his hand in the air. Hermione stared.

"Don't mind him; I gave him some muggle chocolate bars and some sugary candy I found in Dudley's secret stash underneath his bed… I didn't know he'd get so… hyper." Harry said, glancing at Ron sheepishly.

"Hey HARRY! Do you have anymore of that chocolate stuff? That stuff is AWESOME!" Ron yelled this in Harry's ear.

Harry winced. "Ron, you ate it all. Why don't you tell Hermione what you did this summer?" Harry said slowly, as if he was very young. Ron nodded eagerly.

"Yeah, this summer, me, Ginny, Fred and George played Quidditch."

"Ron, you do that every summer." Hermione said impatiently.

"I know! Isn't that so cool?"

Hermione sighed. "I'll talk to you later, when the sugar wears off."

"Yeah! Later!" Ron said jumping up and down. As Ron ran around the platform, bumping into people, Hermione turned to Harry.

"Harry? How was your summer?" Harry's face changed at once, looking more grim at the mention of his summer. Hermione felt like slapping herself-for a minute there he seemed to be pretty cheerful, but now he looked sad. But the look seemed to pass as Harry shook his head, as if to clear his mind of any thoughts of Sirius' death.

"How it is usually. Avoided my Aunt and Uncle, annoyed Dudley whenever possible, and walked around at night. What about you?" "Well, I had a lot of work to do, essays, homework, studying, reading books. How it is usually." Harry smiled, apparently glad to have the topic switched to her. "I guess we all had pretty uneventful summers. At least we know Hogwarts won't be as dull."

Hermione shook her head. "There's never a dull year there. We'll probably-oh it's time to get on the train!" She tried to lift her suitcase out, but it was too heavy for her.

"Here Hermione, I'll get our luggage and you get Ron." Harry lifted her suitcase out, struggling to pick it up. "Your suitcase is really heavy Hermione! What do you have in here?" "Books, naturally," Hermione said looking at Harry as if he asked if the sky was blue or green. "Yeah, well, go get Ron before he hurts himself" Harry panted, dragging her suitcase over to the train.

Ron was still running around the platform. He stopped when he saw her. "Hey look, it's Hermione!" he said, pointing at her. He grabbed a 1st year Hufflepuff boy that was passing by and pulled him over to them.

"Please don't hurt me!" cried the boy, cowering. "Look, it's Hermione!" Ron yelled to the boy, who was trying to escape with little success.

Hermione grabbed Ron's arm and dragged him to the train. Ron still was holding the sleeve of the Hufflepuff boy, so he got dragged along too. She saw Harry sitting and pulled Ron and the boy inside the compartment.

"Hi Harry!" Ron yelled. "Who's that?" Harry asked, pointing at the small boy. "Oh him? That's Ferenzonaba," said Ron. "My name is Paul!" said the boy. "Oh, sure it is, _Paul_…" Ron said loudly. "Poor kid, he doesn't know what he's saying right now. He's obviously out of his mind," Ron whispered to Harry. "I agree completely Ronald. He's obviously out of his mind," Hermione said looking directly at Ron. Ron nodded. "I know! It's quite sad, actually. Poor Ferenzonaba." "That's right Ronald. It's very sad." Hermione said, still looking directly at Ron.

"You know what guys? I'm kind of sleepy…" Ron fell back on the seat and began to snore loudly. Hermione shook her head, lead Paul out of the compartment, and began to read a book. They stayed like that for the rest of the ride to Hogwarts, the only sounds were Ron snoring, the turning of pages in Hermione's book, and the crinkling wrappers of Harry's chocolate frogs and other candy he bought.

Hermione woke Ron up when they arrived at Hogwarts. She slapped him hard on the face. He screamed and jumped up. "Why'd you do that for?" he yelled. Harry burst out laughing. Hermione glared at Ron. "You were drooling all over my robes," she said, gesturing to her wet robes. Ron blushed. "Hermione, I swear I'll never eat muggle candy again." Ron glanced at the wrappers sticking out of Harry's pocket. "Hey Harry, is that muggle candy? Can I have some?" Hermione slapped him again. "Ow!"

As the three of them were making their way outside, they passed by Paul, who was dragging his oversized trunk slowly past the compartments. He looked up at them and froze. "Hey kid, could you move please? We're trying-"Ron said, but was cut off by Paul. "Ahh!" Paul yelled, abandoning his trunk and running out of sight. Ron turned to Harry. "What's his problem?" Ron asked staring at the space where Paul stood. Harry didn't answer. He pulled Paul's trunk to the side and ran after him. " Paul, wait!" Ron stood there with his mouth open. "What-Who-Where-Hermione?" He asked, turning to her desperately. Hermione rolled her eyes and continued walking toward the exit. "You're on your own Ron". Ron stared at her, and then turned around. "Wait Harry! Who's Paul?" He shouted, running after Harry.

On her way out of the train, Hermione bumped into Malfoy, her least favorite person at Hogwarts. She tripped over Ron's suitcase, which he had left in the hallway after chasing after Harry and the mysterious Paul. She fell forwards onto Malfoy, who was knocked down to the floor. Hermione landed on top of him. She stayed like that for a moment. Then she realized she was sitting on Draco Malfoy, and she blushed deeply. She jumped up as quickly as she could and began brushing off her robes.

"Granger, I know you can't resist me, I don't blame you because no girl can, but you better get the hell off of me! These are new robes and I don't need your dirty mudblood self dirtying them!" he said as he stood, glaring at her. She glared back.

" I already am off of you, you idiot! For your information Malfoy, I don't like you, and no girl in her right mind would. Except for Pansy, who can't be considered a girl, because she looks more like a dog. As for your new robes, congrats. You now have Ronald Weasley's drool all over them." And it was true. Malfoy's formerly clean, black robes were now covered in the nasty substance that was Ron's drool. Silently Hermione thanked Ron for drooling on her-the look on Malfoy's face when he saw his disgusting robes was definitely a Kodak moment. She wished Colin was here. She gave him a smirk to rival his own. He looked at his robes in disgust.

"You stupid mudblood!" He made to grab her, but then stopped. " I don't have time for this now, but assure you Granger, I'll make your life hell later. I'll have plenty of opportunities, with us being Head Boy and Girl; I'll be around you pretty often. It would do you good to know your place-in the dirt, with all the other mudbloods. " He was red from anger and disgust.

Hermione paled. Malfoy smirked at her. "Oh, didn't know did you? Of course I would be Head Boy. Who else would be better suited?" He looked amused at her pale face. "See you later, _roommate_" He laughed and went out the door. Hermione went out too, still a bit shocked. 'I should have known though. It would have to be him, if Snape and Malfoy Sr. wanted it that way. How I despise him…' She continued to curse Malfoy out in her head as she walked to the carriages pulled by the Thestrals.


	2. The House Unity Project

Ron and Harry came over to the carriage she was in. "Malfoy's been bothering you?" Ron asked immediately, cracking his knuckles threateningly. "I heard you and him yelling at each other after me and Harry lost Paul-whoever he is. Harry won't tell me. He says it would be better if I didn't know." Harry laughed at the confused look on Ron's face. Hermione sighed. "It's nothing Ron. He's not bothering me." Ron looked a bit disappointed. "Okay, well if he does bother you, Harry and I will take care of him!" Ron and Harry high-fived. Hermione rolled her eyes.

They got out of the carriage. As they walked they heard a shriek coming from in front of them. They all froze. But it was just ugly Pansy Parkinson.

"Eww! Draky! Your robes are covered are covered with some icky goo!" Hermione was laughing so hard she was doubled over. In his haste to insult her, Malfoy had forgotten to clean his robes. "It's nothing Pansy!" said Malfoy hurriedly. Hermione stopped laughing for a moment to talk to Ron. "By the way Ron, thank you for drooling on me when we were on the train. It really helped me out!" Then she continued laughing.

"Hermione? I have no idea what you're talking about!" Ron looked at Harry for help. Harry shrugged. "First Harry, then you. You guys are so confusing! I'm so confused!" Ron looked at Hermione, who was still laughing, and then at Harry, who was laughing at the look on Ron's face again. "Ah!" Ron cried, clearly frustrated. He sped up, walking in front of them.

The students went inside, talking and laughing. They all waited for the sorting to be over. Ron was complaining as usual. "I'm so hungry! When will this thing be over?" Ron whined. Hermione slapped the back of his head. "You're so stupid Ron. You had all that candy on the train!" Ron gave her a dirty look and rubbed the back of his head. "Well that was…" he looked at his watch, "5 minutes ago! I'm still hungry!" "Shut up Ronald! That's all you care about, food! No wonder you don't have a girlfriend!" "I'll have you know-"

"Shut up both of you! The sorting is done and here comes Dumbledore!" Harry hissed, turning his attention to Dumbledore. Dumbledore gave his usual warnings, and then started to talk about unity. "I've said it before, and I'll say it again. There must be more house unity in Hogwarts, we cannot be divided from within, for how will we unite outside to defeat the dangers that will soon fall on us? He paused to see their reactions. Everyone at the Gryffindor table was looking at each other, obviously skeptical that they would ever get along with Slytherins, for they felt that being friends with Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs would be pretty simple. But Slytherins? Never.

Dumbledore cleared his throat to get their attention again. "Also, this year we have a new DADA teacher. Please welcome Mr. Benson," Dumbledore said, waving a hand toward the new teacher. The new teacher stood up. Hermione saw that he was a middle-aged man with thinning black hair, and dark brown eyes. He was slim and of average height. He had round red glasses. All in all, Hermione thought he looked like a pretty average guy, nice but strict. Hermione turned to her friends.

"What do you think?" Hermione whispered. Ron shrugged. "Normal looking, he doesn't look so bad." Harry nodded in agreement. "But you can never know for sure just by looking at a person," Harry said logically. Ron and Hermione nodded too. Then they turned back toward Dumbledore.

"I think that is about it. Let's eat!" Dumbledore waved his hand again, and the food appeared. Ron looked greedily at all the food. He started to grab everything in sight and load it all onto his plate. Harry and Hermione exchanged looks and sighed. 'That's Ron for you. He's always thinking about food.' She wasn't very hungry herself, so she looked around, her eyes falling on Draco Malfoy. She shuddered at the thought of sharing a dorm with him. 'I'll just try to stay away from him, that's all I can do'.

After dinner was over, Dumbledore dismissed everyone but Hermione and Malfoy. "Since you two are Head Boy and Head Girl, I'm sure you know you have your own rooms. Follow me and I'll show you where they are." Dumbledore gave them both a smile and then led them out of the Great Hall. They followed him silently, until he came to a stop beside a black door that neither of them had ever seen before.

"This is the door to your common room. In there you'll find two doors. The door on the right is yours, Ms. Granger. The door on the left is yours, Mr. Malfoy. I'll leave you two to pick a password. He left them.

"How about 'Gryffindors are stupid?" Malfoy said with a smirk.

"No way! How about 'Slytherins should die?"

"Yeah, right. 'How about 'Purebloods'?"

"That's stupid."

"You're stupid!"

Hermione sighed. "Look Malfoy, I just want to get into the damn room. Pick something!" Malfoy thought for a moment. " Crystal Shards''" he said.

"Fine. Go in already. The door swung open.

They enter the common room. It had red sofa with gold pillows. On the other side there were a couple of dark green soft chairs. There was a large table in the corner of the room with 3 chairs. On the walls there was a picture of Salazar Slytherin and Godric Gryffindor. They were sleeping at the moment.

Malfoy walked to the door on the left, and then turned to face her. "If you know what's good for you, stay out of my room!" Hermione snorted. "Why would I want to go in your gross room?" Malfoy raised his eyebrows in mock surprise. "Well, seeing how you have an enormous crush on me Granger, you might not be able to control your obvious passion for me." He laughed at her anger

"You're such a dumbass Malfoy! Not in a million years would I ever like you! It's you who better stay out of my room, because I learned some new curses over the summer that would make you…how should I put this…very uncomfortable for the rest of the year. Or your whole life." She gave him a dazzling smile and then laughed at the incredulous look on his face as she walked into her new room, slamming the door behind her.

The next morning in Potions, Snape walked in with the news of an assignment that they would have to do.

"I will be pairing you up with people that you don't normally get along with…simply because I like to see you suffer. Well, not exactly. You will also be paired this way because this is a new attempt at creating House Unity. We'll see how well it works," said Snape. He gave a rather mocking half-smile. Clearly, Snape believed that these projects wouldn't actually create House Unity. He thought it would fail miserably. But, looking at the half-smile Snape gave; he meant what he said before: He would love to see them suffer. Snape's smile faded and his look became the usual one of contempt. He continued to talk. " You all have different assignments, so don't think about getting help from people not paired with you," at this Snape's eyes lingered on Harry and Ron with a look of utter loathing on his face, while Harry and Ron glared back at him. "Now, this project will be a major part of your grade, so I suggest that you learn how to…get along," he sneered at the thought. Ron and Harry seemed to agree. The were looking at each other and making disgusted faces-obviously they knew there was no way they were getting along with a Slytherin. "These pairings come straight from Headmaster Dumbledore, so there are no excuses and no exemptions. Nobody will be paired up with anybody from the same house, obviously, as this is part of the House Unity Project." He looked around at all the students. "Mr. Potter, you will be working with Mr. Crabbe, Mr. Weasley with Ms. Parkinson, Mr. Longbottom with Mr. Goyle, Ms. Granger with Mr. Malfoy…"

Hermione groaned. She always had to work with Malfoy. She barely listened to the other pairings, only aware of Malfoy's evil grin. She realized Snape was speaking about the assignments. "I will give each of you a piece of paper with the assignment on it. These are due at the end of the month. Class dismissed."

Hermione looked at the piece of paper Snape handed her on her way out. It said:

Ms. Granger and Mr. Malfoy:

Ms. Granger will tutor Mr. Malfoy in Charms for the House Unity Project.

"I have to tutor Malfoy in Charms! There is no way I'm doing that!" She turned around and went back into the classroom. Malfoy was already there. He was currently pleading with Snape. "Please Professor; don't make me work with her! I don't like her!" He thought for a minute, a smirk on his face as he continued. "Well, she is really attracted to me, but she's a horrible- Oh, hello Granger-little…" Malfoy greeted her as she walked in and then resumed insulting her. He was having trouble describing her, "Well, I can't find a word bad enough to describe her." He gave her a suggestive smile. Hermione was incredibly angry. Her face turned red. "Oh yeah? What makes you think that I'd enjoy working with you?" Malfoy stared at her in disbelief. "Because Granger, you're so in love with me that you can't think straight." He said matter- of- factly. Hermione stamped her foot. "You…I…hate…no way…ahh!" Hermione yelled in frustration, running her hands through her hair. "See? You're speechless. This is the way you should always be, Granger. It's nice not having to hear your shrill voice every time a teacher asks a question." "My voice is not shrill It's-". Hermione was cut off by a swift remark from Snape. They both jumped. They had forgotten he was there, though he had been right in front of them the whole time.

"This has been quite amusing but I feel I must break up your little lover's quarrel to remind you that I have not paired you up, but the Headmaster. If you want to complain, why don't you go to him?"

"But Professor, this is Potions class. Why do I have to tutor him in Charms?" Hermione asked desperately. Snape gave her a piercing look. "Because he needs help in that subject…and because I said so, of course. I never said that the project was about Potions. It's not a Potions project." With that, Snape walked smoothly out of the room, leaving behind Malfoy, who had a huge smirk on his face, and Hermione, whose mouth was wide open. "We aren't going out! I don't like him!" she called after Snape. Snape ignored her. Malfoy yawned. "Oh, shut up Granger. You know you like me. I know about all your fantasies…" He trailed off, watching her face and snickering. He sat down on Snape's desk. 'What nerve he has, sitting on his desk…he's so stupid.' She sighed loudly, and sat down in a seat. She suddenly felt extremely tired. She put her head down. "Malfoy, leave me alone…" His demeanor changed, as he went from amused, to angry. He glowered at her. "Fine, Mudblood. Not like I wanted to be near you in the first place." He turned and walked out of the classroom. Hermione sighed again. 'Finally, he's gone'. As if on cue, Malfoy stuck his head back in "Meet me tomorrow, at 5:00 in the common room. We're still stuck together for this tutoring, you know." She groaned. 'Damn, I forgot.' "Fine! Although I would rather die than spend an evening with you! I hate you!" Malfoy came back in and sat down on top of Snape's desk for a second.

"Trust me Granger, The feeling is mutual." He left without another word.

Hermione lay her head down on the desk again. 'Why me?'


	3. Annoying Malfoy, and mirror too

Hermione woke up the next morning extremely tired. She had been thinking about 5:00, when she would be forced to tutor Malfoy, and ways to get out of it. She thought all night but didn't come up with any ideas. If she didn't meet him at all, he'd tell Snape. She couldn't ask Dumbledore to change it, because he'd never agree to it-he put her with Malfoy in the first place. 'Where am I? Why is it so quiet?' she thought, rubbing her eyes. She looked around. 'Oh yeah, I'm Head Girl, I've got my own room.' She stretched and opened the door to the bathroom in her room. After a quick shower, she brushed her hair-well she tried to anyway.

'My hair is such a mess!' She tried to pull the brush through the mass of fluffy hair but it got stuck. She yanked the brush out and stared at it. Quite a bit of it was stuck on the brush. 'There goes some of my hair again!' Everyday her hair would come out in her brush due to the pulling. It was a lot, but Hermione had so much hair nobody could even see that any came out at all. She looked carefully at her reflection.

'God, you need to do something about your hair! It's awful!' the mirror shouted. "Watch it! I'll break you in a second!" She screamed at the mirror. 'Sorry' said the mirror, timidly. "You better be!"

She gave a last angry look at the mirror, then put her books in her back and hurried out of the room.

"Talking to yourself-the first sign of insanity" said Malfoy, who was leaning against the wall next to her door, examining his nails.

"I wasn't talking to myself; I was talking to the mirror!"

"Talking to inanimate objects -the second sign of insanity"

"But the mirror told me that-"

"Inanimate objects talking back to you-third sign of insanity."

"Shut up!"

Malfoy smirked at her. "Great comeback Granger, it's so incredibly original. Although you hang around Weasel, maybe that's why, the guy doesn't have an original bone in his body."

She shoved him, which didn't really have an effect because he was already against the wall. He raised his eyebrows.

"Now really, Granger, come on. I know you can't keep your hands off me but please- try to! I don't really enjoy the feel of mudblood filth on my skin." Malfoy said, wiggling his eyebrows at her. She shut her eyes tightly. She was already getting a headache. 'Ugh. I can't manage 3 minutes alone with him without feeling sick. How am I going to get through tutoring him for an hour?'

"Please tell me that last night was a nightmare and that I'm not really going to have to tutor you," she pleaded.

He gasped. "Why Granger! I didn't know you dream about me! I'm flattered…but I don't want mudbloods dreaming about me. It's just not right," he said, putting his hand on his chest in fake shock.

"Whatever, I'm leaving." She pushed past him to get to the door, and heading toward the Great Hall. Malfoy came after her and walked behind her.

"Don't walk behind me, Malfoy." She said without turning around. He ran up to her to walk beside her. "Is this better?" he asked, falling into step with her, She rolled her eyes at him. "Leave me alone, Malfoy. Go find your stupid bodyguards and that ugly pug girlfriend of yours!" He ignored that and continued to walk beside her. They were nearing the entrance. Hermione felt a bit anxious. There was no way she was walking into the Great Hall side-by-side with Malfoy. She'd be the target of Lavender and Parvati's gossip the whole day-and maybe more than one day if she was really unlucky. And Hermione didn't feel all that lucky today.

"Get away from me Malfoy!" She hissed, trying to walk away from him. He grabbed her arm to prevent her from moving away from him. . "Leave me alone, or I'll punch you in front of everyone!" He stopped and looked at her eyes. She looked serious. He stepped back, and looked at her carefully for awhile. Finally he said "The mirror was right. Fix your hair, mudblood. It looks like a bird's nest." He gave her a cold look, and entered the Great Hall without her.


	4. Potential Body Guards

Hermione was incredibly happy to be away from Malfoy. 'It's so annoying and tiring to be around him so much!' She walked to sit down in the empty seat next to Ginny, and across from Harry and Ron. Ginny smiled at her. "So, how does it feel to have your own room?" Hermione laughed. "Great! Except for Malfoy…" she said, her expression darkening. Ron and Harry immediately looked at her, Ron actually putting down his fork, looking very concerned. Hermione stared in disbelief. Ron stopped eating because he was worried about her wellbeing? Aww…that was sweet of him. But she'd get a permanent, overprotective, body guard in the form of Ronald Weasley if she told him about Malfoy and the things he had been doing to bother her. And if she was really unlucky, she'd get Harry as a body guard too. And Hermione was now certain she didn't feel lucky today. 'Here it comes. The interrogation of Hermione Granger begins…now.'

"Has that bastard been bothering you Hermione?" he asked, looking at her anxiously. "No Ron, it's nothing I can't handle, just arguments, you know. No big deal!" she said quickly. She hoped they would believe her. She really didn't want body guards as friends. Only idiot people like Malfoy have body guards as friends. Ron was just about to interrogate her more when Ginny, thankfully, interrupted.

"So, what kind of project are you and Malfoy doing?" Ginny asked. "Tutoring in Charms," Hermione said dully. She instantly regretted speaking about it, because then Harry immediately looked at her with very wide eyes. 'Looks like I probably will get a body guard now,' Hermione thought, feeling glum.

"You have to tutor him? Hermione, no you can't! Who knows what he'll do? He might hex you!" Harry looked horrified. 'Oh great, one more thing I have to think about.' She thought. She was worried now.

"Thanks Harry. I hadn't thought of that," Hermione said sarcastically.

Harry looked at his plate. "Sorry," he mumbled.

"I have to, anyway. I already talked to Snape. Malfoy talked to him too. There's no way out of it…maybe it won't be too bad," she said hopefully, not really believing it herself. Harry and Ron still looked very upset. Hermione was frustrated with them.

"Oh Ron, Harry, just let it go! I can handle him!" Hermione half yelled. Harry and Ron looked at her skeptically. Hermione could see they were not convinced, but their hunger beat their concern about her. Ron shrugged and began to eat again. Harry gave her a small smile and then proceeded to pile bacon on his plate Hermione watched them warily. She hoped they were truly done with the Malfoy conversation. She didn't feel like talking about him again. She'd rather put him out of her mind until it was truly necessary: at 5:00.

"So Harry, you think the Chudley Cannons will win the game this Wednesday?"

"I dunno Ron, I don't think so."

"What? Of course they will!"

"But isn't one of their beaters injured? That's the best beater on the team!"

"So? They'll get a new beater!"

"Where are they going to find a better beater than him?"

"Well there is always…"

Hermione smiled. 'I guess they're done discussing me and Malfoy. That's good.' She heard a squeal from the Slytherin table and looked over there curiously. Pansy was talking to Malfoy. Actually, she was idolizing Malfoy. She was practically licking his feet. Well, there's nothing new there.

"Oh Draco, you look so very cute today!" Pansy squealed. Malfoy grabbed the metal container that held the rolls, and looked at his reflection. "Perfect, as always," he said, flashing the girls at the Slytherin table a mega-watt smile. The girls all sighed. Pansy sighed the loudest. Hermione snorted. 'Yeah, he's perfect. Less than perfect, that is.'

"How's Granger? Is she bothering you, Draco dear? Because I'll shut her up, if you need me to," giving him a doting smile and kissing him on the cheek. Malfoy grimaced, but quickly changed his expression to one of indifference. Hermione laughed out loud at this. 'Let's see Pansy shut anyone up.'

"Well, you know, we had to get some things straight first, I think she's rather attracted to me-it's hard not to be of course," He said, giving a knowing smile to Pansy and the girls around her. They all sighed again. "It's so true, Draco." Pansy said giving him puppy-dog eyes. He smiled appraisingly at her. "Anyway, I tried to get her to realize that she's a mudblood and I'm a rich pureblood. I think she's in denial. I think she doesn't want to admit that she's a dirt mudblood, who would?" Malfoy asked. The girls all shook their heads.

"Who would want to admit that they were a dirt mudblood? Nobody, Draco. It's only natural," Pansy said knowledgeably. Then she sighed some more and grabbed Malfoy's hand tightly. Malfoy loosened her death-grip on his hand. Then he continued.

"She sort of got it but it's going to take awhile for the feelings to go away, she really likes me. She keeps on falling on me." He said off-handedly, taking a large gulp of pumpkin juice. Pansy was looking very worried. "Oh, Draco, what are you going to do about it? I don't want that mudblood bitch hanging all over you!" She held onto his arm, as if he was going to run away with her at that very moment. Pansy looked around for Hermione at the Gryffindor table, and saw her watching them. Pansy gave her a look that said "Back off, he's mine." Hermione turned around quickly. 'Oops. She saw me. Great, just great. Now it will look like I really do like him!'

"What were you looking at, Hermione?" Ginny asked as Hermione turned around. "Nothing, Ginny…um I thought I saw something, but I didn't". She had turned a bit pink in her embarrassment of being caught looking. Ginny looked oddly at her. Hermione looked away. Ginny was still looking at her rather suspiciously. She looked back, and started to complain about her "project" some more to distract her. It would not be good if Ginny realized that she was looking at Malfoy. Even if it was just out of curiosity, Lavender and Parvati would have a field day with that information if word reached their ears…by accident or on purpose.

"I mean, really Ginny, 'Tutor Malfoy in Charms' is not even a project! I asked some other students and they said they got things to research, or a difficult potion to make, things like that.. Why do I have to do this?" Ginny didn't look up; she was engrossed in spreading strawberry jam on a piece of toast. "Maybe because Snape knows you would probably enjoy researching an obscure potion, and decided to give you something that would be hard." Hermione sighed. Ginny was probably right. And there was nothing she could do about it…though asking Harry and Ron to beat up Malfoy was looking pretty good right now.


	5. Tutoring

All through the rest of the day Hermione worried about 5:00. She didn't want to help Malfoy, she didn't want to be near Malfoy, but she had no choice. She stayed in the library awhile till it was time to go back to meet him.

Malfoy wasn't there when she went to sit in the common room at 5:00. At 5:15, Malfoy walked in.

"You're late, Malfoy." She growled.

"I didn't know you were looking forward to this so much." He said, falling back onto the Slytherin couch. Hermione sat across from him on the Gryffindor couch. She threw a pillow at him.

"I'm not, you idiot! I just want to get this over with!"

"So teach already!"

Hermione opened her notebook and began asking him questions. "So can you do the levitation spell?" He looked sheepishly at her. "Uh…no."

"Wow, you're really behind!" she exclaimed.

He gave her a dirty look. "If I were ahead, then you wouldn't be here, would you?"

She ignored him and started the lesson. 30 repulsive minutes later, Malfoy finally mastered the levitation spell. She was shocked it actually took a half hour. 'Malfoy must be more of an idiot than I thought. And that's saying something, because he is a huge idiot already.

Hermione sighed and closed her eyes. Tutoring Malfoy had been very tiring. Not only did she have to teach him, but she had to put up with his constant insults. 'And find insults to throw back at him', she thought with a small smile. At least it had only lasted 30 minutes, instead of an hour as she had previously thought. She opened her eyes and looked at Malfoy, who was currently staring at her, deep in thought. 'Probably thinking about the next insult he could use' Hermione thought, with not a small bit of scorn.

"You can go now Malfoy," Hermione said, pointing to his door. "Tutoring is over." He didn't move. "I said, tutoring is over," Hermione said louder. She looked at him in annoyance. "What do you want Malfoy?" she asked desperately. She was so tired; she didn't feel like moving to go to her room.

"Why were you looking at me during breakfast?" he asked suddenly, looking at her closely. Hermione opened her mouth, but shut it quickly. 'Why was I looking at him?' Hermione couldn't come up with an answer.

"I don't know," she admitted. She thought a bit more. "Curiousity, I guess. Your dog of a girlfriend was making high-pitched squealing noises, and I was wondering where the awful sound was coming from. And then I realized the awful sound was coming from an equally awful person," Hermione said with a bit of a grin. Not one of her best insults today, but a pretty good one, considering how tired she was. As of the last 10 minutes, all her insults had been 'Shut up Malfoy'. She frowned, remembering what he said. "Malfoy, you are such a liar. I have no feelings for you whatsoever! You keep on making up stuff! And I only fell on you once, by accident!"

Malfoy smirked at her. "I don't seem to remember you falling on me once, I remember it was twice." Hermione shook her head. "It was once, Malfoy. It was once, by accident." He continued smirking. He walked around her. Hermione was getting uneasy, he reminded her of a shark, circling its prey.

"Are you sure about that, Granger?" He looked into her dark brown eyes. "I-I-I think-yes, yes I'm sure," she said weakly, looking into his grey eyes. 'What's wrong with me? Just slap him or walk away…' Hermione's body wasn't listening to her head. He came closer. Hermione couldn't think straight when he was so close. She wondered what he was doing. Malfoy smirked at her and took out his wand. Pointing it at Hermione, he said "Wingardium Leviosa!"

Hermione yelled as she was levitated above Malfoy's head. "Malfoy put me down right now!"

Malfoy smirked again "Gladly" He let go and she was falling. 'Oh my god I'm going to die, I'm going to be hurt, I'm going to-"Malfoy caught her. '-be caught by Draco Malfoy?' She was shocked. She looked incredulously at his face, which had a triumphant and arrogant look. He dropped her on her feet.

"Malfoy…" Hermione began, but stopped. She didn't know what to say, so she said nothing. "Twice," he whispered. "It was twice." She stared at him. "Malfoy, what…?" She touched his arm to get his attention, because he was looking away.

At her touch, Malfoy turned around so fast his hair flew, covering his eyes. Flipping his hair out of his eyes, she could see that his eyes were filled with an anger that she had never seen before in his eyes, not that she looked, of course. His gaze of utter hatred frightened her, and she took a step back, but he followed her. He grabbed her hand and pushed it off his arm. Hermione yanked her hand back, afraid of what he might do.

"Don't touch me Granger," he hissed, his eyes burning into hers. "Don't you ever touch me again!" With that, Malfoy stormed back into his room slamming the door so hard that the portraits of the founders woke up.

"Miss Granger? What has Malfoy done now?" asked Godric. Salazar gave him an evil look. "It is obviously Granger who is at fault, not Mr. Malfoy." Hermione ignored them. She then sat down onto the couch, burying her face in a pillow.

Malfoy had done something so completely strange, and she didn't know what to do about. When he had caught her and smiled that conceited smile, she had felt disgusted and angry. But deep down, she thought that she had felt another emotion, which was disappointment. When he had put her down she had wanted nothing more than for him to hold her again…no she didn't. She was pretty sure she had imagined that feeling. But he changed so quickly back to the old Malfoy that she wasn't sure he had changed at all.

She truly hated him. He was her worst enemy. He was evil to the core. Most importantly, he confused her. And Hermione Granger did not like being confused. She didn't know what to think, she didn't know what to do, and she definitely didn't know what to say. So she said the first thing that popped into her mind.

"I hate you, Draco Malfoy." His answer came floating to her, although he hadn't said anything at all and he hadn't heard her. She remembered him sitting on Snape's desk with the look of arrogance that he wore almost constantly. What had he said?

"Trust me Granger, the feeling is mutual."

Hermione hoped he felt as confused as she did right now. It would serve him right for acting…that way. Exactly how he had acted, Hermione wasn't sure, she didn't know his motives behind it. She didn't know, but she was going to find out.


	6. Chapter 6

The next morning Hermione jumped out of bed as soon as she opened her eyes. She wanted to leave for breakfast before Malfoy did. She definitely didn't feel like seeing him this morning. She took a super-quick shower, got dressed at top speed. She didn't bother with her hair, though she glanced at it quickly in the mirror. The mirror kept quiet out of fear that Hermione would smash it, but it hummed softly while Hermione touched her hair.

She gave up and grabbed her books and rushed out of the room. She saw the door and ran for it-but was stopped a familiar and extremely unwanted face. Hermione skidded to a halt to avoid bumping into Malfoy, who was calmly blocking the door and looking at her with a satisfied smile on his face. Hermione yelled in frustration and smacked Malfoy with her books that she was holding.

"Ouch! How dare you hit me?" said Malfoy, rubbing the spot on his shoulder where she had hit him. Hermione looked at the spot. He'd have a bruise. Good. At least it wiped that stupid smile off his face.

"Serves you right, Malfoy, get out of my way!" She tried to push past him to get to the door but he was stronger than her. "Serves me right? What did I ever do to you? No, change that…what did I do to you recently?" He laughed. "What the hell was that last night?" she asked as she stopped trying to push him aside. He stopped laughing. "Well Granger, it's pretty obvious what I did last night." He rolled his eyes and laughed some more.

"Shut it Malfoy! It's not obvious; I don't know what you're thinking!" Malfoy looked at her, exasperated. "Granger, I was practicing the levitation charm! You have to admit, levitating you means that I really understand it. It's not like a pillow or something."

'Oh, that makes sense…but still…' "So what was with the whole 'catching me' thing?" Hermione asked slowly. "Well, Granger, I think we discussed this last night. You fell on me, and I had no choice but to catch you," He said casually. "I suppose I could have let you fall…maybe I should have, it would've been funny. But you know, I kind of like where my nose is right now, I don't want "The Weasel" to rearrange it for me." "Malfoy that was your fault! You levitated me!" said Hermione with annoyance. Malfoy shrugged. "A minor detail I'm willing to ignore. Besides," Malfoy said leaning in, "You liked it, Granger. You liked being held by me." She scoffed.

"Malfoy, there is no way in hell that-". Malfoy leaned in closer. She could see his blue eyes even closer, and noticed that they also had a bit of black in them, and if you looked closely, the colors seemed to swirl. 'His eyes look like the ocean' Hermione thought, and then gasped. What was she thinking? This was Draco Malfoy! She didn't pine over him like some love-sick teenage girl! No, these thoughts were reserved for Pansy, and Pansy alone. But he was so close…maybe if she moved back, the thoughts would go away. She had to get away, but he had her trapped, with nowhere to look but his face. "Malfoy," Hermione whispered. "You're too close." Malfoy raised his eyebrows. "Am I Granger? I hadn't noticed. Just hold on a second." Malfoy reached for her hand. She opened her mouth to say something, to protest, but she couldn't. Her voice seemed to stick in her throat the moment touched her hand. Her own hand was very warm, and his, she noticed as their palms touched, was warm also. She had always thought his hands would be like ice, but she was wrong. She looked at his hand and then at his face. His eyes were had grown darker, and she realized whose hand she was almost holding.

Hermione pulled away in horror, her face very pink. "What were you thinking Malfoy?" She shouted, and then ran around him and out the door.

Malfoy watched her go, and then ran his hand through his hair. "What was I thinking?" he said aloud, and then walked through Hermione's open door and sat on her bed, as it was closest.

He truly hated her. She was always so smart, but it wasn't just that. It was how she flaunted her intelligence, how she always had to be right, and how she always thought she was superior to everyone when it should be him who was superior to everyone. He was a Malfoy, was he not? But with her grades always higher than his, she humiliated him every summer when he got his grades and had to show his father. He had to explain why a stupid mudblood always beat him at everything. It was her fault he got punished every summer. Because he knew that he would never best Hermione Granger, he had already reluctantly admitted that she was smarter than him, and that's the way it always was going to be. She hung around with the two losers, Potter and Weasley, which was enough of a reason to hate her guts. She was viewed as such a goody-goody, but really she had broken so many rules that she should have been expelled by now, but NO, she was friends with Potter, and Potter was exempt from the rules. So he hated her. He really did.

So what was he thinking? What was wrong with him? He knew that he had done it to make her uncomfortable, he had seen the look she had given him the night before, and knew it would only make her more uncomfortable if he touched her again. It was a look of anger, mixed with disgust, discomfort, uncertainty, and disappointment. Malfoy wanted to make her look that way again. An uncomfortable and uncertain look was rare on Hermione Granger's face, where most of the time she sent looks of knowledge and perfection to everyone, so filled with information that it was almost impossible to think that there was anything she didn't know. Malfoy enjoyed the feeling that he could bring a look like that to her face with just a simple touch-it made him feel even more superior than. But when he caught her last night, and when he touched her hand this morning, he gained the feeling of superiority and power, but he also got another feeling from her touch. A feeling very different from the feeling of power

She confused him. He didn't know how she did it, but she confused him. And Draco Malfoy did not like being confused, not at all. She was making him feel strange, and he didn't like the feeling. 'Just ignore it, pretend it's not there. I'm probably just hungry or something, just imagining these feelings, stupid mudblood bitch. Yeah, that's right. Okay, time to go.' He turned to leave, but a voice called out to him.

"You need to fix your hair, it's messed up!" said the mirror in Hermione's room.

"Shut up!" yelled Malfoy. "I'll break you in a second!" The mirror laughed. "That's exactly what your Hermione Granger said before!" "SHE'S NOT 'MINE'!" Malfoy shouted angrily. "Then I bet you wish she was yours," said the mirror slyly. "THAT'S IT!" Malfoy said. He grabbed a book from the floor and threw it as hard as he could at the mirror. It shattered into a million pieces. He smiled.

"Never doubt a Malfoy; they always go through on their threats." Then he left for breakfast.

The room was silent after Malfoy left, but the peaceful silence was soon pierced by the sound of laughter from the founders' portraits. "Ha Ha Ha," laughed the portrait of Salazar Slytherin. "Oh man, that was great. 'Never doubt a Malfoy', oh yeah, he showed that mirror!" Godric Gryffindor frowned.

"But that was Ms. Granger's mirror; he had no right-"Salazar waved him off. "Oh please, she can always repair it, she didn't like it anyway." Godric nodded. "That's true…" "And," Salazar continued, "It was insulting him! I mean, come on, Mr. Malfoy having feelings for Granger? When's that ever going to happen? She's from a different house, it's just not right!"

Godric rolled his eyes. "Need I remind you of your love for Helga Hufflepuff?" Salazar paled. "That-That was only for a week!" Godric shook his head. "Oh no, Salazar, that lasted for years, you pined for her." "Okay, okay!" he said. "It's true! But she's beautiful, so kind…" he sighed. Godric snorted. "She's fat." "No she's not!" he snapped. "She's…big boned" he said lamely. Godric snickered. "Oh, shut up already!" said Salazar angrily.

"Don't be embarrassed…it helps the House Unity Project, doesn't it?" Godric said, trying to cheer him up. Salazar just snarled. Giving up, Godric shrugged and went back to sleep. Salazar went back to sleep too.

And then the common room was truly silent.


	7. Malfoy's confessions

Hermione ran as fast as she could towards the Great Hall. At first, she wasn't sure whether she should go to breakfast or not. She didn't want to see Malfoy, and she kind of wanted to be alone, where she could sort out her feelings in peace. Hermione didn't like the idea of going to breakfast with her face pink and her hair tangled from running. How would she explain herself to her friends? But finally she made up her mind. She would go to breakfast, because if she didn't then everyone would go looking for her, and then she would have much more to explain when they found her.

She arrived at the door and she fixed her hair and skirt as best she could, then she entered, bracing herself for questions. But as she sat down, she realized Harry and Ron were busy arguing, and they didn't notice that she walked in.

"Come on Harry, why can't you get me some muggle candy? That stuff is so good!" Ron pleaded, giving Harry his patented Puppy-Dog-Eyes.

"Ugh Ron, you know that your Puppy-Dog-Eyes doesn't work on guys!" said Harry giving him a disgusted look and chucked some fruit at him.

"Yeah, well I hoped it would..." Ron muttered, slumping in his seat.

"Hi Harry, Ron" said Hermione, giving them a slight smile.

"Hi Hermione!" they said. Ron didn't look up, he was busy picking strawberries off his robes.

"Harry won't give me any muggle candy," Ron whined. "Harry, why won't you give me muggle candy? I want some of that candy with the rainbows in it, those chocolate pieces thingys with the 'W''s on them, those soury worms, ooh and all those chocolate bars!" Ron said, drooling at the thought of all the candy. "I swear Hermione, I don't know how they got rainbows in the candy, but it's the best thing I've ever tasted. They've got red rainbows, green rainbows, and oooh my favorite the-"

Harry shoved a couple blueberry pancakes in his mouth with his fork . Ron gave him a dirty look, but quickly swallowed the pancakes and started to eat, forgetting about muggle candy and concentrating on his favorite activity-eating. Harry turned to Hermione.

"So Hermione, how was tutoring with Malfoy? Horrible? Disgusting? Sickening? Annoying?" Harry asked grinning at her.

"All of the above," said Hermione sighing as she pushed around the pancakes she had put on her plate. She glared at her plate as she thought of Malfoy. "He's worse than ever! I don't know how I'm going to get through all this. For the second smartest student in the school, he sure is stupid. I mean, he didn't even know the levitation spell! I hate him, I loathe him, I can't stand him, he makes me sick! With all his 'I'm a Pureblood so I'm better than you!'! And all his 'You're a mudblood'! And most of all his stupid, idiotic SMIRK! God, is that all he ever does? Smirk, smirk, smirk, he never smiles, all he does is smirk, and glare and give you his 'I'm high and mighty look'. And 'My hair is better looking than yours Granger-you should be ashamed of yourself'!" Hermione paused to catch her breath. She stared at her pancakes for awhile, and then started stabbing them with her fork, imagining that each was Malfoy's pale face. "Honestly, he is the most bastardly person that I have ever met-and that's not even a word! And I don't care because I hate him so much!" Hermione paused. Then she started stabbing her pancakes again, somehow more furious than before. "HIM AND HIS STUPID EYES, AND HANDS AND HAIR THAT'S ALL FULL OF GEL AND FALLING AND CATCHING AND TOO CLOSE AND AH!"" She breathed deeply, catching her breath. She smiled sweetly at Harry.

"Thanks Harry, I feel so much better now." She then turned back to her pancakes and started eating, not noticing that they were ripped into little pieces.

Harry, whose eyes were wide and his mouth was wide open in shock, only managed to squeak "Anytime."

At the Slytherin table, Malfoy was surrounded by girls, as usual. Pansy was practically sitting on Malfoy's lap, as usual. Malfoy was cool, calm, and collected, as usual. Nobody could've guessed that only 10 minutes ago, he had been as agitated as Hermione was now. But smashing Hermione's mirror had really made him feel better. He remembered that he was in charge, he was a Malfoy, and he had power over everyone. Including the mudblood Granger. And...a mirror. Malfoy realized that loving the feeling of power you could get from smashing a mirror was slightly crazy. 'Feeling powerful over a broken mirror-fourth sign of insanity' He was suddenly brought out of his thoughts by a loud squeal, which came from Pansy. As usual.

"Draco! Did you hear what that mudblood said just now?" She stared at him with angry eyes. Malfoy was taken aback. Pansy never looked at him like that. She always gave him looks of utter and complete adoration. He found it quite tiresome, if you want to know the truth. He wondered what she was mad at. 'Strange...'

"No Pansy, I don't make a habit of listening to the Gryffindors' pointless blather. I'm way above them, you see." Malfoy raised an eyebrow at her. He knew it would bother her. He loved to bother her.

"Well...neither do I-but you see- well...Of course-I'm a Slyther...and they're Gryffin- I'm above them..." Pansy stuttered. Malfoy gave her his almighty smirk that Hermione hated with a passion. He knew what he said would throw Pansy off.

"What's that Pansy? You actually pay attention to those losers? Wow, Pansy...I would think that someone like you wouldn't be interested in those Gryffindor idiots, you being a pureblood and all. I don't know Parkinson, I might just have to reconsider you hanging around with me..." He gave her a look of mock disappointment.

His words didn't really have the effect on her that he wanted. Her uncertain gaze turned angry.

"I knew it! I knew it all along!" Pansy yelled at him. "You ARE in love with the mudbloood! I can't believe you Draco! You caught her? She fell and you caught her? You should've let her fall! We're not Gryffindors, Draco! We're Slytherins! We aren't all righteous and stuff like those Gryffindorks! Draco, oh Draco, why? And you were close to her-you might've kissed her! Hands-what's that? Draco what's the matter with you? I thought you hated her! Draco-"

Malfoy had heard enough. He grabbed Pansy and spoke quietly to her.

"Listen Parkinson. I don't want to hear anything more about Mudblood Granger," Malfoy muttered in her ear. "I've had enough of her last night. I spent the whole evening with Granger, working on Charms with her. And all that about liking her-loving her even? Pansy, you are more of a fool than I thought. We hate eachother! She hates me, I hate her. I hate her as much as she hates me. And that's never going to change, you hear me Pansy? Never! And all that about falling and catching? I may be a Slytherin, Pansy-and I'm the best Slytherin here-but I know enough to know that Weasel Boy is bigger than me, and yes I admit it-he is stronger than me. I don't want my face to be mangled.

And when she fell, I caught her. And yes, I was close to her. And yes, our hands did touch. But I hate everything about her. Everything about her! But you didn't see the way she looked at me. I made the Gryffindor Princess, the smartest of the Golden Trio, the witch of extreme _perfection_," Malfoy spat out the word bitterly, "flustered and confused. Do you know how it feels to make her flustered? To make her look at me that way that she did? To make her finally shut that big mouth of hers? And to finally give her something that she doesn't know the answer to-me? To see her eyes wide and a bit frightened?" Malfoy sighed, so low that Pansy wouldn't be able to hear.

"Draco-" Pansy began in that whining voice of hers. It sounded to Draco like nails on a chalkboard, and his temper flared. He put both his hands on Pansy's shoulders, gripping her tightly.

"Pansy," he hissed, looking her in the eye. "Have you heard nothing I have told you? Do not interrupt me again!" Pansy nodded quickly. He released her.

"I'll tell you how it feels. It's exhilarating. It's pure freedom-it's pure power! I like the way it makes me feel, but with _her_, with Hermione Granger, I feel free. And yet still powerful. And it's a good feeling, Pansy."

"Draco-" Pansy said quietly, but Malfoy ignored her. Once he got started like this, there was no stopping him.

"I suppose," he said, in his own world now,"That my hatred for her, and her mutual hatred, fuels this feeling I have. It creates such a feeling that when we are together, we just explode." He turned to Pansy. Pansy was nodding slowly. He glared at her. Pansy cringed under his gaze.

"Do not think that it is love I feel for her! It's far from it. I'll never love her or even slightly like her, she's nothing to me, I hate her! And she hates me. But I-" Malfoy faltered. He wasn't sure how to say it.

"What?" Pansy asked, staring at him.

"She, I, um-" He didn't know what to say.

"What?" Asked Pansy again.

"She makes me feel..."

"What!" said Pansy impatiently.

"She makes me feel...strange" mumbled Malfoy, not looking at her. He ran a hand through his hair. That was quickly becoming a nervous habit.

"Strange? Strange? _Strange_?" Pansy shouted, turning a shade of red that wasn't exactly very becoming on her. Not much was very becoming on her.

"DAMN IT PANSY, STOP SHOUTING! YES, STRANGE! WHAT ARE YOU, SOME NEW BREED OF AN UGLY PARROT? GEEZ!" Malfoy shouted, almost standing up in his chair.

"WELL DRACO, YOU DON'T HAVE TO SHOUT!" shouted Pansy. Malfoy gave her his Patented Death Glare. Pansy instantly became timid, and started to eat again, looking away from him. After awhile she gathered up enough courage to speak to him again.

"Draco if you know she hates you, why did you say she was so attracted to you?" Pansy asked.

"Pansy, you are such an idiot. Of course she doesn't like me-she hates me! Not to say that all of what I said wasn't true. I think deep down, she has some sort of hidden affection for me. I can read the signs, because I'm not an idiot and gullible like you are."

"But she hates you! And you hate her! The feeling is mutual-you said so yourself!"

"Of course. But you should know Pansy... there's a fine line between love and hate."

"What? What'ja say Draco?" said Pansy rather stupidly.

"Nothing Pansy. You are so stupid sometimes! Most of the time. All of the time." He smirked. Pansy glared at him. He instantly became very serious and grabbed her arm tightly.

"Parkinson."

Pansy looked up, and a bit of fear could be seen in her eyes. Malfoy thought it was a pleasant change from her Patented "Draco-you-are-the-absolute-hottest-boy-in-the-whole-school-I-want-to-marry-you-and-then-have-lots-of-beautiful-pureblood-babies-that-have-your-hair" look. Her Patented look raised his ego, which was great. But what Malfoy liked more was the feeling he got when he looked at Pansy's scared eyes. The feeling of power and superiority, which was what he craved.

"Tell anyone anything you've heard, and I'll kill you."

Pansy didn't doubt he would. He was a Malfoy, and Malfoys always go through on their threats.

Little did Malfoy know that it wasn't Pansy who would tell everyone all that she heard, but someone else.

A/N: Hey I actually updated! Because I actually got some reviews! And a lot of hits! You know I like reading stories better than writing them, but hey, I kind of like this story, I have no idea what to do with my christmas story. Thank you to all who reviewed I love you guys! When people review then I update because I like to know that someone is reading. And yes, all of my chapters are sort of long. Because I don't know how to do short chapters. If someone could tell me how to do line breaks, I'd be grateful. Okay, this story will get better, it'll have a lot more plot and stuff, not all fluffy stuff. And the next chapter will be better than this one!

Review, it makes me happy and makes me feel like continuing!

-Slim Shady, AKA Cassandra Rose.


	8. The totally popular Spy Girlz

A/N: Parvati and Lavender might be OOC but, I dunno...I made them that way. The term Brillo Head is credited to my twin, Jeremy. And Spy Girlz...belongs to me and my friends when I was 10...so embarassing! It was spelled Spy Girls, SG mostly

Breakfast was over and the day sped by quickly. Nothing unusual had happened during the day. Just the usual lessons. It seemed as if the teachers had given more homework than usual today, so after the students had finished, they all went straight to bed. Even Hermione and Malfoy went to their separate rooms as soon as the day was done and fell asleep. Hermione barely talked to Harry and Ron, aside from her outburst at the table, she was so tired. Hermione and Malfoy managed to avoid eachother for the rest of the day, neither one of them being in the mood to argue and insult eachother.

And so it was 11:00 at night, and everyone was asleep.

Everyone except Lavender Brown and Parvati Patil.

It was a well-known fact that the two very girly Gryffindors loved gossip. They would tell anyone who would listen the latest rumors of the day. But lately they had become unsatisfied with the amount of gossip they were able to distribute to the public. They wanted something more. And so Parvati came up with an idea that Lavender said was "Oh My God Parvati, that is so like the best idea ever!".

And Parvati's idea was why they were the only two students not sleeping. And why they were currently sitting in the Room of Requirement.

"Parvati, have you seen how cute Seamus has gotten these days? I'm telling you, that guy is hot with a capital H!" said Lavender excitedly, leaning foward in her armchair that she had thought of. Parvati and Lavender were sitting in a room that was filled with all sorts of high-tech gadgets. Parvati was currently sitting at a large table, examining a gadget that had a large mirror on it. She looked up at Lavender in annoyance.

"Lavender we'll never get this done by morning if we keep discussing boys!" said Parvati.

"You're one to talk Parvati, you spent a half an hour talking about Dean Thomas' new haircut!" said Lavender, glaring at Parvati.

"Well so what? It's a very cute hair cut, I especially like the tiny curls he left out in the front..." said Parvati dreamily.

Lavender snorted. "He looks like a muggle "Brillo" with that hair cut. Brillo head."

Parvati waved her off. "Whatever, Lav. Lets just start looking through this footage." Lavender nodded in agreement, and walked over to the table.

Nobody had ever wondered exactly how Lavender and Parvati got their information. Everyone just assumed they had either made it up, or had heard it from someone. But they were wrong. The girls used all sorts of technological advanced spy gear to eavesdrop on people's conversation. Then they mixed it all up to suit their needs. They called themselves the Spy Girlz. SG for short.

And why waste all that valuable gossip information just by telling a couple people? They had decided to make a newspaper that would give the kids of Hogwarts important gossip, for fun, teasing, or even blackmail. They called it "The Super Secret Files of the Totally Popular Spy Girlz" This would be their first issue, and they were in a rush to print it out by tomorrow morning at breakfast. That way everyone could read it, and they'd become "Even more totally popular than before!".

"Lavender, you do know that when we come out with "The Super Secret Files of the Totally Popular Spy Girlz" tomorrow at breakast we'll become even more totally popular than before?"

"Of course! We'll get even more dates than we usually get!"

"I don't know, I've already got this month's dates in my Spy Girlz Studentz Planner," said Parvati, a bit disappointed.

"Oh. More boys for me then!"

Parvati was concentrating very hard on the gadget with the mirror.

"Um Parvati? Maybe you should stop looking at the Spy Girlz Super Make-up Mirror, and start going through the days gossip with me?"

"But I have to fix my hair! One hair is sort of sticking in the wrong direction, it's a SG hair emergency!" whined Parvati, still obsessively staring at the gadget. Lavender pushed the Spy Girlz Super Make-up Mirror away and brought over what looked like 4 tiny black dots. Lavender tapped her wand on the first dot and it expanded to what looked like the wizard version of a muggle camcorder. The camcorder had "Hufflepuff" written on it in purple script.

The Spy Girlz Personal House Elf Spy taped these tiny black dots under each table in the Great Hall with spell-o-tape. Each of the black dots called Wizardz Automatic Spyz by the Spy Girlz recorded every conversation that was going on at the table. The Hufflepuff WAZ recorded every one of the Hufflepuff's coversations at Breakfast, Lunch, and Dinner. Same goes for the rest of the houses. At the end of each day the Spy Girlz' Personal House Elf Spy planted into the Hogwarts House Elfs by the Spy Girlz' Special Connectionz Peoplez collected each of the WAZ and safely delivered them to the Spy Girlz.

Lavender pointed her wand at the WAZ and said "Specialis Revealo!". A piece of parchment appeared, sliding out of an invisible slot in the WAZ. Parvati looked at it carefully. It had the names of all the Hufflepuff students and arrows connecting them to another person, indicating that a conversation took place. Underneath their names was the topic of the conversation. Parvati and Lavender may have been girly- girls, but that doesn't mean they weren't smart. They had designed all this Spy Gear by themselves.

"Okay, anything good at the Hufflepuff table?" asked Parvati, looking over at Lavender. Lavender laughed.

"Not really. They're talking mostly about the upcoming Hogsmede trip. Then there's the usual school stuff. Oh, and there's one about the sex appeal of Mcgonagall. Francis Weltheimer seems to think that her robe hides a lot of-"

"Stop! I really don't need to know that!" said Parvati, turning green.

Lavender laughed. "Okay, no good on the Hufflepuff table."

"Like usual" Parvati sniffed. They then pulled over the Ravenclaw WAZ. After poring over it for 20 minutes, the girls stopped.

"These Ravenclaws! All they talk about is HW and classes! And what kinds of books they have!" said Parvati, outraged.

"Except for Looney Lovegood. She talks about the Quibbler. And those imaginary creatures of hers." Lavender pointed out.

"Yes, but everyone listens to her crazy talk all the time! It's nothing new and exciting," Parvati said frustratedly.

Lavender nodded in agreement. "I guess we'll do Gryffindor now," she said.

Parvati pushed over the Gryffindor WAZ. Parvati pointed her wand at it and said "Specialis Revealo!" like Lavender did before. The piece of parchment appeared, and Lavender grabbed it.

"Dean had a discussion with Ginny about quidditch," said Lavender, reading the parchment.

"BOring!" Parvati said.

"Neville obsessed over potions, apparently he forgot to do Snape's essay."

"Not good enough!"

"Really Parvati," said Lavender, "How will we get this issue out by morning when everyone is so frickin' boring?"

Parvati shrugged. "True gossipers only gossip the best," said Parvati.

"Oh Parvati, that's so beautiful!

"Yeah, I know it is. Made it up. Let's get back to Gryffindor, shall we?" Lavender skiped Dean and Neville and looked at the rest of the list. She gasped.

"Parvati, wow, I saw some things that are going to blow them away!"

Parvati sat up straight in her chair. "Oh my god, Dean and Seamus were fighting over who gets to date me?"

Lavender glared at her. "Of course not! Everyone who's anyone knows that Dean and Seamus have been after me since first year!

Parvati gave her a dirty look, but didn't comment. "So, who then?" she asked irritably.

"Well..."

* * *

Hermione woke up early in the morning, ready to give operation Running-Out-The-Door-Before-Malfoy-Wakes-Up another try. Hermione realized that her mirror was broken and shards of glass were lying all around the room. This could only mean one thing..._Malfoy_. She was furious to think that Malfoy had actually been in her room, 'That's low, even for him!'. She was less concerned about her mirror, she hadn't liked the stupid thing in the first place. She cleaned the glass up, hopped into the shower, got dressed. She didn't even bother to fix her hair. Grabbing her books, she rushed out of her room, she was almost at the door... 

WHAM. She tripped and fell to the ground. Her books scattered all over the room, and her carefully written essay flew into the fireplace, where it burned into ash. 'Noooo! Not my essay!' Hermione's knee was bleeding and it stung badly, but what did she care? Her essay!

She healed her cut with a healing charm, grabbed her books and ran for the door again. She was almost at the door...

And she made it! She then walked quickly to the Great Hall for breakfast. As she opened the door, she realized it got quiet, and everyone was staring at her. She sat down next to Harry, confused.

"Harry, why is everyone staring at me?" she asked. Harry didn't look at her.

"Well, Hermione the thing is that-" he began, but he was cut off by Ron, who hadn't been eating, just staring at some sort of letter he held in his hand.

"Look at this!" Ron shouted angrily, thrusting a newspaper in her hand. The newspaper was purple, with black script.

Hermione took the newspaper and read it:

**The Super Secret Files of the Totally Popular Spy Girlz**

**_Your # 1 stop for all gossip, rumors, and blackmail, going on at Hogwarts!_**

**By Parvati Patil and Lavender Brown, Gryffindor **

_Top stories_:

Hermione Granger's secret love pg 1

Draco Malfoy's secret passion pg 2

_Other Stories_:

Ronald Weasley's obsession pg 3

Dean Thomas and Ginny Weasley: No longer a happy couple pg 4

_Other cool stuffz:_

Ask the reader pg 5

Are you in love? Take this quiz to find out! pg 5

Polls pg 6

Hermione snorted, throwing down the paper. "The Super Secret Files of the Totally Popular Spy Girlz? That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard! What kind of garbage are you reading, Ron? Why did you order this?"

"Uh, Hermione? Look around for a second," said Harry uncomfortably. Hermione looked up, and she was met with tons of purple newspapers. Everyone seemed to have a copy of the girly newspaper. Hermione looked up at the Headmaster's table. 'Even the teachers! Dumbledore has one, Flitwick, and-wait. Is that Snape?" Snape was currently poring over the purple newspaper, and it looked so out of place in the hands of the potions master. He seemed to be...enjoying it.

Hermione glanced curiously at the newspaper. 'What could be so interesting that Snape would enjoy reading?' She turned to Harry and Ron. Ron was still grumbling. "Ron?" she asked, wondering what could have made him so upset.

"Read it!" he shouted, glaring at her.

"Well, you don't have to shout Ronald!" shouted Hermione.

"Stop shouting, both of you!" shouted Harry.

"Fine, I'll read the stupid paper!" said Hermione, sighing. Ignoring the cover A picture of Lavender and Parvati winking and smiling, she flipped open to page 1.

Hermione Granger's secret love 

By Parvarti Patil and Lavender Brown.

_No longer will there be the age old question "Does Hermione Granger like Ron Weasley or Harry Potter?" because we, the Spy Girlz have discovered Hermione's true love. Draco Malfoy of Slytherin._

_Now, you might say "How is that possible? She's a Gryffindor, and he's a Slytherin! Everyone knows they hate eachother!" but we, the totally popular Spy Girlz have discovered the truth. _

_Yesterday at breakfast, Harry Potter asked the simple question of "How was tutoring with Malfoy?" For anyone who doesn't know, Hermione has Malfoy as her partner for the House Unity Project. We think that the House Unity Project is a load of crap and it will never work, but that is a another story. Anyone might think that Hermione is very upset that Malfoy is her partner, but we, the totally popular Spy Girlz, know better._

_Harry's innocent question got a very non-innocent answer. According to our very reliable source, Hermione raged on and on, but then at the end, reluctantly admitted that he was higher and mightier than her, that his hair looked better than hers, that he was the second smartest student in the whole school, and she loved the way he smirked. She then went on to say that he is a bastardly person, but she didn't care because she loved him so much. She even agreed that she was a m nasty name for a muggleborn. She also hinted to some sort of incident that happened during tutoring the night before see page 2 for the 411_

_Harry was quite overwhelmed by her steamy confession of love, and was speechless the rest of the day._

_We Spy Girlz were very shocked to hear that bookworm of Hogwarts had fallen for the hot bad boy from Slytherin. She is always burried in her books that we thought she had never seen the hotness of the guys at Hogwarts, except her two best friends, Harry and Ron. To tell the truth, Harry Potter is considerably hot, but Ronald Weasley just doesn't compare to Harry or Malfoy. We always thought that Hermione would eventually be a boring librarian, but now we both agree that she has potential._

_We have spoken to some girls of Hogwarts, to see what they thought of Hermione and Malfoy._

_"She doesn't deserve him, that ugly ! How dare she even think of his total hotness! She's not worthy of the sex god of Slytherin," cried a Martina Davis, a 6th year Slytherin. _

_"Personally, I was wondering when she'd get around to notice Malfoy. I mean, he's evil and all, but just take a look at him! So sexy!" said Ginny Weasley, one of our fellow Gryffindors and sister to Ronald Weasley. _

_"Well, I dunno about Hermione and Draco," said Luna Lovegood dreamily, resident Looney of Hogwarts Ravenclaw, "I don't know why she's getting all caught up about him. Usually she's so level-headed and brainy, this just isn't very like her. I dunno Lavender, maybe she has Wurtlehoppers in her brain, controlling her every move with their 7 prickly toes? Lavender, where did you get this information from? Are you sure you-" _

_And then Luna had to go somewhere very important, and couldn't finish her sentence._

Hermione was furious. "To even think that those two airheads wrote that I am in love with Draco Malfoy! How dare they!"

Ron stopped grumbling at looked up eagerly. "Airheads? Hermione, you have airheads? The muggle candy that's out of control? WHERE?"

She looked at Ron disgustedly. "I have been publically humiliated, and you think of MUGGLE CANDY?" she shouted.

Ron looked sad.

"This is why they wrote about you Ron! You are obsessed with Muggle Candy! You've got a problem!" Harry told him quietly.

"I DO NOT HAVE A PROBLEM!"

"Yes you do!"

"No I don't!"

"Yes you DO!"

"No I DON'T!

"Ferenzonaba!"

"What? Who's Ferenzonaba? What is it with all these people and Ferenzonaba? That's all they say to me, Ferenzonaba! They don't explain it, they just yell Ferenzonaba! What kind of idiot comes up with the name Ferenzonaba," said Ron, angrily.

"A red haired one," Harry mumbled, snickering. Ron looked up,

"Hey guys? Can we leave the muggle candy subject and get back to my problem? Draco Malfoy?" Hermione said angrily.

"Well sorry Hermione, but this article about my obsession with muggle candy really got to me..."

"Lavender and Parvati write about you being ugly and all you think of is the article about you and your obsession with muggle candy?" Hermione asked in disbelief.

"They didn't say I'm ugly, they just said I was less hot than Harry and Malfoy. That doesn't bother me, I mean look at Harry and Malfoy and you can see how-" Ron started to say, but Harry cut him off.

"Please Ron, for all our sakes, don't finish that sentence," said Harry, shuddering.

"I just can't believe this! Twisting my words around to make it seem like I'm in love with him! How did they hear our conversation? 'First my essay, then this!'Oh no, what'll I say to Malfoy? He'll just get more ammo to make fun of me!" Hermione fretted, wringing her hands and glancing at the Slytherin table. Malfoy was nowhere to be seen.

"Seriously, Hermione, read the article! It's demeaning, that's what it is," Ron said, completely ignoring what Hermione had said before.

"Ron, if that will make you shutup and listen to what I have to say and stop being so self-centered and selfish..."

"Huh? Hermione what did you say?" Ron was confused.

"I said I'll read the damn article!"

"Good," Ron said, happily.

Ronald Weasley's obsession

By Lavender Brown and Parvati Patil

_We would never have thought someone as quidditch obsessed as Ronald Weasley would ever have room in his brain for something else._

_But we, the everlastingly popular Spy Girlz have the complete and total low-down on Ron's new love. No, it is not a physical love, such as the love between Draco Malfoy Resident hottie of Hogwartz! and Hermione Granger Resident prude of Hogwartz, but an obsession. Yes, Ronald Billius Weasley is obsessed... with muggle candy._

_I wouldn't have thought it was possible, but Ron's mind has completely flown away with the idea of muggle candy. We asked some of our loyal readers what they thought of this._

_"I think it's really stupid. What's so good about muggle candy? Our wizard candy is completely more betterer," said Lauren Gerud, 5th year Hufflepuff. "What do you mean "betterer" isn't a word? Of course it is! And who said I was a loyal reader? How could I be if you girls only-"_

_Lauren Gerud suddenly remembered she had detention, and ran off before she could finish._

_A person who wishes not to be named said "Of course Mr. Weasley is sane. How could he not be addicted to the various charms of muggle candy? I myself enjoy a mountain of candy I've got in my...dorm." We Spy Girlz would like to tell our readers that our source might not be quite sane himself, so ignore his opinion._

_"Ferenzonaba," said another source that says he fears for his life if we would tell his name. The source refused to elaborate._

_We Spy Girlz have our own opinion. Ferenzonaba might be Ronald's source of muggle candy. Maybe he's got him drugged. He has seemed particular stupid lately, more so than usually. "Ferenzonaba" might be messing with his abnormally small mind._

_Lavender would like to say that Ron's mind isn't abnormally small, he's just mentally challenged._

Hermione started to laugh after she had finished reading Ron's article. Ron blushed to the roots of his hair in anger.

"So, you think this is funny, do you?" Ron said furiously.

"Yes!" Hermione laughed.

"But they called me mentally challenged! And how did they find out my middle name?" Ron whined. Hermione still laughed.

"Well, what about you, huh? You got Malfoy to think about, so stop laughing at me!"

Hermione stopped laughing instantly. She sighed.

"How can I face Malfoy now?" Hermione asked desperately. "He'll go on and on about it, I'll be the talk of the whole school!"

"Hermione, why are you getting so upset? In fourth year with Rita Skeeter you weren't affected by her at all!" asked Ron.

Hermione turned pink, thinking of the previous morning with Malfoy. "I uh, I don't know, it's just...well..." she stuttered. Ron and Harry waited patiently. Hermione cleared her throat.

"It's just, it's Malfoy, it's not Harry! And I have to tutor him! And he justs gets to me!" Hermione said, not very sure herself. Why did Malfoy get to her? 'It's probably how I felt yesterday morning when he...held my hand. Which was completely disgusting! Ugh, Malfoy! He disgusts me! I hate his freaking guts! But that morning, I felt strange. Nothing that I've felt before. Besides hate. Something else, and I'm probably imagining it, but it's there. It was there.' Hermione grew uneasy as she looked at her best friends, who were waiting for her to say something. She sighed.

"I don't know you guys. I just don't know." Hermione looked at them, hoping that that would be enough. Harry and Ron both nodded.

"You're just upset, Hermione. Don't worry about it, I'm sure by the end of the day you'll have it sorted out," said Ron kindly. Hermione was grateful that Ron had finallylet the muggle candy incident go.

"But I'm just afraid to face him," Hermione said a bit ashamed that she was scared to see him.

"Hermione, you're the smartest witch at Hogwarts, and you should never let someone like Malfoy scare you," said Ron. "If you're scared, me and Harry can always help, you know, protect you a little..." Ron added, giving her a protective look.

Hermione froze. 'Oh my god, no. No body guards!' "That's okay! Both of you, I can deal with it, don't worry Ron, it's okay!" she said quickly.

Harry smiled at her. "Hermione, you shouldn't worry so much about what Malfoy will say to you. Malfoy is probably wondering what you will say to him! He's just as humiliated as you are. Why do you think he isn't at breakfast? He left as quickly as he could!"

"What are you talking about Harry?" Hermione asked.

"Take another look at the newspaper," Harry said, handing her the newspaper and pointing at something on it. Hermione leaned in to look at it:

Draco Malfoy's secret passion pg 2

Hermione grinned.

* * *

A/N: Thanks again for all the reviews! I get so happy when I see them! Okay, so the next chapter's gonna be Malfoy's reaction, and then some Hermione/Malfoy interaction. And what's going to happen to Lavender and Parvati? I have a good plan for those two Evil Laugh. Review, makes me update faster! And in case anyone is reading the Crazy Theme Song Parodys of Harry Potter, I updated that one too. I'm really liking that last one, maybe you will too? 


	9. Malfoy's Secret Passion

5 minutes before Hermione walked into the Great Hall

* * *

Malfoy was furious with himself. He couldn't believe that he had said all those things to Pansy. Pansy wasn't the most trustworthy person at Hogwarts-she had a big mouth and told everyone every little thing that goes on in her life and the lives of others. Just two days ago Malfoy was forced to listen to Pansy blab on and on about what she wanted for her birthday-and her birthday was 5 months away! And sometimes Pansy would tell people things that they really don't need to hear-like the color of Millicent Bulstrode's new bra. Stuff like that was best left unsaid, especially at breakfast. Malfoy almost threw up.

She was his girlfriend and yet Malfoy didn't even like her. She wasn't prettier than other girls, she wasn't smart, and she bored him to death. He often called her names and told her he didn't like her, but the girl never seemed to get the hint. He couldn't openly dump her. What would his father say when he found out? His parents were friends with her parents, and Pansy told them everything. He wasn't afraid that Pansy would tell her parents. He had threatened her, and she knew that if she did tell anyone, he would go through with his threat

'But why Pansy? Why did I tell Pansy? Why did I tell anyone, for that matter. It isn't if I told her anything really important, just venting I guess. But I shouldn't need to tell anybody anything. I'm supposed to keep it to myself, not to blab out all the ideas that come to my mind like some Gryffindor loser! Pansy probably still thinks I'm in love with that mudblood. Oh, who cares what Pansy thinks, as long as no one else heard...'

Malfoy pushed all his thoughts out of his mind as he entered the Great Hall. It got quiet as he entered. Malfoy smirked. 'I must be looking pretty good today! Sure I've got yells and screams, but total silence? I'm hot!' He sat down next to Pansy and nodded to her as a greeting.

"Hey Draco," said Pansy quietly, not meeting his eyes. Malfoy's eyes narrowed.

"Parkinson, what's going on? If you told anyone about yesterday, you better say so now!" Malfoy hissed. Pansy flinched.

"Oh, I didn't tell anyone, Draco, I swear! You can give me Veritaserum if you don't believe me! But Draco, look at this newspaper, everyone has it! Just read it...!" She brandished the purple newspaper and Malfoy took it reluctantly, still giving her his Death Glare.

"If I find out you told..." Malfoy said, warning her. She nodded, a bit frightened. 'The way I like her to be.' Malfoy flipped it open to page 2.

* * *

Malfoy's secret passion

By Parvati Patil and Lavender Brown

_ The totally popular Spy Girlz have already uncovered Hermione Granger's feelings of toward Draco Malfoy. But it was unknown how Malfoy felt about Hermione. We have learned that Malfoy returns her feelings fully, maybe with a bit more passion and a lot less reluctance than Hermione._

_ We overheard Malfoy pouring his heart out to Pansy Parkinson, the ugly pug of Hogwartz and Malfoy's girlfriend. Pansy brought up the topic of Hermione, and started making fun of her, calling her a M-------. Malfoy stopped her angrily. He said he didn't want to hear Pansy call her that, that he had spent the entire night working on Charms with her and he finally realized that he liked her, he might even love her. He called Pansy a fool to even think that he ever liked her Pansy, but he liked Hermione, and even though she hated his guts, he loved her and that was never going to change. Even though he was a Slytherin, he still liked her, but he didn't want Weasel Ronald Weasley to beat him up and mangle his face We Spy Girlz totally agree with his reasoning, Malfoy's face is just too beautiful to be punched!._

_ Pansy, of course, was very upset, and tried to talk to him but Malfoy told her to shut up. He obviously wanted to finish his rather long confession of true everlasting love for Hermione. He then told her about an incident that happened during tutoring._

_ We have discovered that somehow Hermione fell, and Malfoy caught her. Their hands touched, then Malfoy kissed her. ._

_ Malfoy called her the Gryffindor Princess, the smartest of the Golden Trio (Harry, Ron, and Hermione), and the witch of extreme perfection. He said that he loved making her flustered and confused, that being with her was exhilarating. It was pure freedom, pure power. _

_ "But with her, with Hermione Granger, I feel free...and it's a good feeling Pansy._

_ He came up with a theory why his beautiful love came to be. When they are together they just explode with love Lavender would like to say that that is so beautiful. She's actually crying.. She makes him feel strange, something that he's never felt before._

_ Pansy of course, got angry when he confessed his love for the bookworm, Hermione Granger. Malfoy told her to shut up, and then went on praising the various points of greatness in his love, Hermione. He said that Hermione might deep down have some sort of affection for him. When Pansy protested, he told her that there is a fine line between love and hate. We Spy Girlz know now that the feeling of love is so completely totally mutual!_

_ This sounds very strange that a super hot Slytherin like Malfoy would ever think of someone like Hermione Granger, but there you have it. Time for feedback from our fans._

_ "This is not possible! This can't be happening to me! Why, Draco? Why did you have to cross over to the Gryffindor side? What about me? What about my dreams, huh? WHAT ABOUT MY DREAMS?" sobbed Adrianna West, a 2nd year Slytherin. We spoke to her kindly._

_ "What! What do you mean Draco would never look at a scrawny little 2nd year like me? I'm not scrawny! I'm beautiful! I'm beautiful dammit!"_

_ After we sent Adrianna off to the hospital wing to get a calming draught, we spoke to Lauren Gerud, a 5th year Hufflepuff._

_ "Are you guys stalking me? I already answered your stupid question about Ron! Stop cornering me! Leave me the hell alone!"_

_ Lauren Gerud wasn't able to answer our question...she was indisposed._

_ "I'm very happy for Hermione and Malfoy. I never knew this was going on, I mean I never noticed any of this," said Ginny Weasley. "But seeing how Dean has dumped me, I like to see a happy couple. Oh yes, you didn't know that Dean dumped me? Turns out Dean is in love with you, Parvati. Oh and Seamus is in love with you too." Lavender would like to say that it is obvious that Ginny was confunded, because everyone knows that Dean and Seamus love her. Lavender should know that this is not the article to debate this. Turn to pg 4 for the 411 on Ginny and Dean._

* * *

Malfoy finished reading and put down the newspaper. "Patil and Brown are going to wish they never were born!" Malfoy roared, causing the whole Slytherin table to stare at him. Pansy looked at him timidly.

"And me, Draco?" she asked carefully.

"I know you didn't do it, idiot! It was Patil and Brown!" Malfoy yelled.

"So, are you still with me?" Pansy asked hopefully.

"Yeah, whatever," Malfoy said, not really caring. Pansy squealed. Malfoy winced.

"God Pansy, shut up!" Malfoy said, rubbing his ears in pain.

"Okay!" Pansy said brightly. Malfoy grabbed his bag and walked toward the door.

"Drakie! Where are you going? Come back!" Pansy asked, confused by his actions. Malfoy didn't look back.

"Nowhere. Anywhere." he muttered.

Lavender and Parvati's words annoyed him so much that he felt as if he couldn't stay in there, where everyone was looking at him, whispering about him and Granger and his '_true everlasting love_' for her. 'How can anyone believe that garbage? Obviously they just made all the articles up! But noo, everyone has to think I have feelings for Granger, other than digust and hatred, but feelings of love! And they think Granger has feelings for me too, oh I read the article about her. I could go bother her about the article... Yeah, that'll make me feel better, getting Granger all upset.'

Malfoy stopped wandering around and set out to look for Hermione. He hadn't seen her in the Great Hall, maybe she was still in her room. There was still a little time before classes started.

* * *

Hermione grinned. "Harry this is perfect! Oh let me read it!" Hermione grabbed the paper and read Malfoy's article. After she was finished she started to laugh. "His beautiful love, oh wow," she said, laughing. Harry and Ron laughed too. Ginny, whom they hadn't noticed before this, spoke to them.

"I'm assuming you've read the Spy Girlz paper? I can't believe them!" Ginny said, clearly furious. "I didn't break up with Dean! And I would never call Malfoy sexy. Maybe a bit good-looking, but-"

"WHAT?" yelled Ron, knocking over his goblet and spilling juice onto table and onto Harry's lap. Harry groaned. Ron didn't notice, he was too busy glaring at Ginny.

"Well, Ron, I am allowed to say when I think someone is cute!"

"But not Malfoy!"

Dean leaned over into their conversation. "See Ginny, this is why I broke up with you, you're always looking at other guys!"

"Dean, I don't look at other guys! And you didn't break up with me! How can you believe what that paper says?" Ginny yelled. Dean ignored her. "Fine, if you're going to break up with me, see if I care! I'll just go out with some other guy!"

"You can't just dump me like that Ginny!" Dean shouted at her.

"I didn't! You did!" Ginny replied nastily.

Hermione decided to go back to the common room and see if she could find the first draft of her essay to hand in. She didn't want to find out what would happen to her if she went to Snape's class without an essay. She got up and walked away, unnoticed by her friends, who still were caught up in Ginny and Dean's fight.

When Hermione got to her dorm, she quickly said "Crystal Shards" and walked into the room. She didn't have much time left, so her plan was to find her draft, get it, and go to class as fast as possible. What she didn't count on was Malfoy being there. But when she went through the door she saw him sitting in one of the chairs. She stopped dead in her tracks, suprised. She tried to go into her room without him noticing but he saw her and stood up, the purple newspaper in his hand. He waved it around.

"So Granger," he said, walking over to her.

"Malfoy," she spat bitterly. She hadn't been around him since yesterday morning, and seeing him made her remember just how much she hated him. He was standing there, with a smug look on his face, waiting for something. 'Probably a confession of my love!' She just wanted to get her essay and leave...and maybe punch him in the face to wipe that self-satisfied look off his face. But she didn't punch him in the face. She shoved him across the room, though. He got up and brushed himself off, and walked back towards her. Hermione rolled her eyes. 'Too bad I didn't hurt him, he didn't even get angry!'

"I hear you're in love with me, Granger," said Malfoy, standing next to her. She stepped away from him.

"Cut the crap Malfoy. You and I both know that those articles were fake," Hermione said, turning away from him.

"It's okay, I understand if you're too shy to talk about it. You being such a prude and all." He said, smirking that smirk that Hermione hated so much.

"I am not a prude!" She said, annoyed.

"That's not what the paper said."

"The paper is FAKE!"

"Oh but Granger, I won't give up on you until you confess your true everlasting love for me!" Malfoy said, putting his hand over his heart.

"You disgust me, Malfoy. I hate you!" Hermione said to him as she turned to walk away. Malfoy grabbed her arm to stop her. She yelled in frustration.

"Don't walk away from me when I'm talking to you," Malfoy said quietly but forcefully. Hermione stopped yelling.

"What do you want from me, Malfoy? A confession of love? Worship? You're confusing, you know that? You confuse me!" Hermione yelled. Malfoy was silent for a moment, but then spoke.

"I confuse you?" he asked, his eyes glinting with something Hermione couldn't place. She nodded slowly

"Good," he said, gazing at her strangely. She stared back at him. He let go of her arm. She shoved him again.

"Granger," said Malfoy, snapping her out of her thoughts. "We're late to Potions," he said calmly. Hermione shrieked.

"Oh my god, Potions started 10 minutes ago! What are we going to do Malfoy? Snape will murder us!" Hermione said frantically, wringing her hands. Malfoy shrugged.

"How can you not care?" Hermione asked, suprised. It was Snape after all.

"Easy. Snape won't murder me. I'm his favorite student. He'll murder you. And I'll just watch and enjoy myself." Malfoy said, picturing Snape murdering Hermione with a dreamy expression on his face.

Hermione ignored him and walked into her room. She searched for the draft essay but couldn't find it. Giving up, she left the dorm and walked quickly towards Potions. She didn't bother to wait for Malfoy to come. She didn't want to be near him.

She arrived at the Potions door and stood in front of it, not daring to open it. 'I just have to do it. If I don't go to his class then the punishment will be worse.'. She still stood at the door, staring at it and not touching it.

"Hey Granger, what's the matter? Too scared to face Snape's wrath?" said a very unwelcome voice from behind her. Hermione sighed.

"It's not that, it's just..." Hermione trailed off, not knowing to say.

"You are such a coward, Granger, Where's that Gryffindor courage?" Malfoy sneered. He pulled open the door, grabbed Hermione by the arm and swaggered into the room, dragging Hermione behind him. Snape turned around quickly. Seeing the two of them, his gave a strange smile. Any kind of smile on Snape's face was strange, but it was an odd, twisted kind of smile. It was, Hermione realized, a look that meant 'You're in deep shit, but I'm going to torture you out of your mind before I kill you with various punishments. His eyes burned rage, barely controlled.

"Miss Granger," he said giving her a calm look that scared her. "Nice of you to join us. How are you this fine morning?" He advanced towards her, and Hermione backed away. "So you think you can come in this late and get away with it? I've got news for you girl, you have two months of detention, helping Filch scrub the dungeon floors and all the bathrooms." Hermione opened her mouth but was silenced by Malfoy, who had stepped up in front of her.

"I don't think that will be quite necessary, Professor. You see, Hermione was with me, and I'm afraid we got a bit...caught up." He gave Hermione a suggestive look. Hermione was disgusted, and her face showed it.

"Listen, Malfoy, It's Granger to you and I'd rather die than do anything with you!" she yelled, her face pink from embarassment and anger. Malfoy gave her a look of adoration, which was totally fake, Hermione noted. A quick glance around the room showed that they didn't realize it was fake. Underneath that look, Hermione could see that he was taking a sick pleasure in doing this to her. Even Snape had stepped back to watch, a barely visible look of amusement in his eyes.

Malfoy shook his head, still gazing at her. "Oh Hermione, you look so beautiful when you're angry! Don't try to deny it, you know you love me..." Hermione got extremely frustrated. He shouldn't be able to get her this mad. She was supposed to shrug it off, like she always did. But for some reason, it got to her. And she didn't like it.

'What can I do to shut him up? He's trying to get at me and it's working! There's no way I'll allow him to bother me like this! He hates me and I know it-but no one else believes that he does! It's my duty to find a way to unsettle him and stop him from playing his idiotic game, trying to bother me, unsettle me, but what can I do?'

Then Hermione remembered her talk with Harry and got an idea.

A/N: I'm very happy with the reviews, thanks you guys, means a lot to me. I know this chapter isn't very good, but the next one will be better. Took awhile because of school Senior year of H.S. sucks-don't listen to those people who say it rocks, too much work, various other things and a serious case of writer's block.

-Slim Shady AKA Cassandra Rose


	10. Bring it on, you filthy death eater

Hermione took a step towards him. "Oh Draco, Draco. You're right, I shouldn't deny my love for you any longer. You see, I've hid my love for you for so long that it is hard for me to say this to you," Hermione said pausing to gauge his reaction. Malfoy was giving her a look of disgust.

"Hermione! You aren't serious, are you? I'm going to kick your ass, Malfoy! I'll rearrange that pretty boy face of yours! You did something to her!" Ron said, clearly outraged.

"Ron, calm down. Hermione knows what she's doing…I think," said Harry, sounding a bit uncertain.

"You sound a bit uncertain! That's not comforting at all, Harry," said Ron anxiously.

"Let the girl have some space. Give it a chance. On wrong move and WHAM-instant knockout for Malfoy," said Harry happily.

"Now that's more like it!" They turned to listen to her speak.

"Ever since my secret has come out in those beautiful purple tabloids-like the one sticking out of our dear professor's pocket," Hermione said, glancing at the newspaper. Snape looked slightly embarrassed.

"I wasn't really reading it…15 points from Gryffindor for making absurd assumptions!" He crumpled up the newspaper and threw it at Ron's head.

"What? What did I do? It's Hermione who's making a scene!" Ron shouted, scowling at Snape.

"Yes, but it's a very entertaining scene. 15 more points from Gryffindor for simply being alive!"

"Oh yeah? Well, I bet you don't even know what Starbursts are!" Ron cried triumphantly.

"Weasley, you-"

"ALRIGHT, SHUT UP ALREADY!" Neville screamed at the top of his lungs. Everyone stared at him. "What? I just want to hear the rest of Hermione's love speech…or whatever you call it." Neville whispered.

Hermione sighed. "Yes, thank you Neville. I have to get the rest of this out before I explode with love for Drakie." Malfoy looked as if he wanted to throw up. Goyle actually did throw up. Hermione waited impatiently as Goyle was picked up and thrown out of the room-I mean, he was carefully walked down to the Hospital Wing.

"As I was saying before, although I have always loved him, I wasn't completely sure if the feeling was mutual. But those lovely tabloids that the two airheads of-

"OH MY GOD! You did it again, Hermione! Muggle Candy! Why is everyone mocking me? What did I ever do to you guys, huh? WHAT DID I EVER DO TO YOU?" Ron screamed.

A Gryffindorgirl with short black hair stood up. "Last week, Weasley, you stole all the food on my plate and ate it. I went to get some more and you ate that too!"

Ron shuffled his feed. "Uh…"

A short Gryffindorgirl with blonde hair stood up too. "You turned my hair red, white, and blue! With stars! I'm not American, dammit! I'm not American!" she shrieked.

"What's wrong with Americans?" Dean wondered.

Ron raised his hand. "That was an accident, I meant to hex Harry's owl."

Harry stood up. "What! Why'd you want to do that to Hedwig?"

"She gave me a funny look," Ron mumbled.

A Slytherin with messy robes and messy brown hair stood up. "Look what you did to my robes and hair, Weasley! I'll get you for this!"

His girlfriend, a slim girl with square glasses put a hand on his shoulder. "Gideon, that's the way your hair and robes look everyday!"

"Yeah, but Weasley doesn't know that."

A rather thin boy Slytherin with a messy set of braids stood up. "He POISONED my cat!" he shouted. Everyone stared at him. "What? You don't believe me?"

"No, not really," said Seamus.

"Darn, I was hoping he'd fall for it.

"SILENCE!" Snape yelled. Everyone quieted instantly. "All of you, not a word out of anyone. And why did everyone feel the need to stand up when they talked?" Everyone shrugged, except for Ron who was sulking.

"Draco, dearest. I owe my life to those two air- I mean gossipers." Hermione continued, glancing at Ron. "Without them, I would've never known how much you truly cared. Breaking up with Pansy for me? I'm touched, Draco. I truly am. Such sweet names you have for me, Gryffindor Princess? Beautiful Draco, really. I never thought of myself as the witch of extreme perfection. I'm ecstatic to hear that you think I am extremely perfect." Hermione finished her rather long speech, and gave Malfoy a dazzling smile. Inside, Hermione was laughing. 'Oh, revenge is sweet. He won't recover from this for a long time. Ha, I can't wait to see what he'll do next. He's probably incredibly angry…oh this is great!'

The classroom roared with laughter. Malfoy's face was red, whether from anger or embarrassment, no one could tell.

'How dare she play me at my own game? Not only has she turned the table, but she's left me speechless! I don't do speechless.' Malfoy thought fiercely, gazing at Hermione in deep thought. What he needed was the best comeback ever. Something that would shut her up, make her look stupid, humiliate her, and at the same make an even greater scene than her. 'Nobody outdoes a Malfoy! I am the greatest at everything, so if Snape thinks that Granger is entertaining, then dammit I have to be the most entertaining! But what to do?'. He had no idea in hell what to do. He did know that for him to make a scene, he'd either have to go along with her accusations or deny them completely. He decided that he'd go along with them, at least for now. 'Some of them are true, I mean I really did say, and it's kind of true-NO! Do not finish that thought! I'm not even safe from her in my mind anymore!' He shook his head to clear it. And then, at that moment, he knew what to do. The question was, would he be able to do it?

Malfoy took a step forward, his eyes glinting with an emotion Hermione could not identify. He stepped closer. Hermione began to back away, a bit scared. He grabbed her shoulders roughly. She couldn't move.

"So Granger, you must think you're so great, almost managing to embarrass me. But I don't embarrass so easily," he whispered in her ear, each word dripping with venom and the promise of revenge. Hermione shuddered as she felt his breath on her neck. She tried to twist away but he held on tight.

"Neither do I, Malfoy. If you're planning to do something, why don't you just do it? I can take anything your weak ass can manage to throw at me." Hermione whispered angrily. 'Why isn't Snape putting an end to this?' Hermione turned painfully to look at Snape. He was busy reading a wrinkly copy of The Super Secret Files of the Totally Popular Spy Girlz that he must have fished out of the trash can near the door. Their classmates were still watching though.

"Oh, believe me Granger, I will be doing something. But I doubt you'll be able to take it" He looked directly into her eyes. Hermione stared back defiantly.

"Bring it on, you filthy Death Eater," Hermione whispered.

"As you wish, you dirty Mudblood." He whispered back.

He wrapped his hand around her waist quickly, pulling her close. Before she could protest he kissed her.

A/N: A bit of Fluff, a bit of stuff… a bit of a word that rhymes with stuff.

Long time, no update, huh? It's called High School, you know, that place, that's the second version of hell, where they take great pleasure in your suffering…

I saw Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire twice, and let me tell you, it got better and better. This is totally the best movie ever. Of the HP movies, anyway. What do you guys think? Awesome, Cool, really cool, really awesome, super, supercalafradgilisticexpealadocius, major cool, cooler than cool, coolio, or just okay? Hey, pick them or one of your own. But Snape was pretty funny, only he didn't get much time in the movie. Poor Snape, my favorite character who I still have faith in. And if he's evil, well then I'll just love him more.

I'm one of those really picky fans, you know the kind that starts screaming in the middle of the movie "Hermione's dress is not pink! It's not pink, it's…blue (I think)! How dare they change the color of Hermione's dress? That is so important! Unfaithful to the book! Freaking unfaithful!" Also the kind that starts grumbling in the middle of the movie "How dare they cut out so-and so! How dare they skip a minor scene that is so totally important to me but not to anyone else! How dare they not mention the name of a tiny minor character! What happened to Archie, dammit! What happened to Archie! WTF! Unfaithful to the book! Unfaithful to the book! Freaking unfaithful!" And of course, I'm one of those that is all like, in the middle of the movie "Oh my god, Jeremy, Draco Malfoy is so hot! I want him! Why was he so ugly in the third one, then all of a sudden he became totally hot? Ron is sooo cute, I mean look at him! I love guys with red hair! Red Hair!" Everyone's all "Shut the hell up!" Then my brother Jeremy starts saying "Cassandra, Hermione is HOT!" And I am…disturbed for some reason.

Total props to Deb-Lil, you motivated me! Also, for the record, I would like to remind you all that I hate my Pen name. At the time, I liked Eminem, now I just…don't. My real music pen name:IThinkMyChemicalRomanceIsAwesomeAndSoIsNirvanaNoIAmNotEmo! And…no. That's just wrong.

Loooong Author's note!

By:

Slim Shady AKA Cassandra Rose


	11. The Kiss

Hermione gasped in shock as he pulled her close. Momentarily paralyzed by surprise, she did not attempt to push him away. He was breathing quickly, and she gazed up at him, her eyes locking on his. She caught a glimpse of a smug look in his eyes, but she had no time to ponder what it could mean because he pressed his lips against hers.

Hermione's initial reaction was to break the kiss and shove him away. She struggled to push him away but his grip on her waist tightened when she tried. The fight to pull her lips away from his was also in vain. Hermione reluctantly gave up.

Malfoy's other hand came up to rest on the back of her neck. She shivered at his touch. He seemed to be pouring effort into kissing her before he had to surface for air. He was kissing her passionately, angrily.

Malfoy wasn't a gentle kisser, Hermione mused. No, this kiss was rough, attempting to cause her pain as well as scaring her. The whole purpose of the kiss, Hermione realized, was to embarrass her, ruin her. To get her back. Gryffindor kissing a Slytherin, forbidden. It would never work, because she wasn't going to fall for his little plot. Like hell she'd allow him to embarrass her. 'I'll turn the tables on him just like I did before!'

Hermione wrapped her arms around him, pulling him, if it was even possible, closer. Malfoy gasped in surprise. And hesitantly, she kissed him back.

All at once she became aware of how close they actually were, how he smelled of some unnamable but somehow familiar scent, how his grey eyes were staring at her startled, how warm his embrace was . All of this might turn any girls head, cause them to lose themselves in the warmth of a day dream.

But Hermione wasn't just any girl, and it only served to remind her just how much she hated him. But she had to kiss him back, if she wanted to gain the upper hand.

Malfoy had almost reached his goal, she had almost given in. He had been ready to break the kiss and then remind everyone that perfect Hermione Granger had succumbed to Draco Malfoy's charm. He'd ruin her, and oh would he savor it. With this stunt he could put the annoying purple newspaper out of his mind. He could put Granger out of his mind, for once and for all he would gain the ultimate power: power over Hermione Granger.

But she had had to nerve to kiss him back! 'That was not supposed to happen! And now, look at her, kissing me back like she actually thinks she's going to beat me at my own game for the second time today!'

Hermione looked into Malfoy's eyes, pleased. He seemed to be having some sort of inner conflict. His eyes focused on her. They shone with determination. Hermione was taken aback.

All at once the kiss became a power struggle. Malfoy, who had surfaced for three seconds of air, kissed her with a renewed, brutal passion. Hermione, who refused to be the first to break away, did the same to him.

"MOVE!" said a distant voice as he grabbed Malfoy and threw him bodily against the back wall. He pushed Hermione to the front wall, separating them. Hermione and Malfoy were jolted out of their daze.

"I have never seen anything as disgusting as your little make-out session, Malfoy and Granger!" Snape yelled, his face tinged green. Hermione's face burned as she looked at Malfoy's disheveled appearance- his tie loose, hair messed up, shirt wrinkled and his lips rather swollen and pink. She could only imagine how awful she looked. He stared back at her looking her up and down and smiling smugly. She rolled her eyes at him. He glared at her.

"What do you have to say for yourself, Mr. Malfoy?" asked Snape.

"Well," he said, standing up with some effort and attempting to fix his hair, "I'm pretty sure Granger enjoyed that, didn't you Granger?" He gave her a sly smile. Only Hermione seemed to notice that the smile was a promise to deal with this later.

"_I _enjoyed it? Me? You're the one who kissed me first!" She said incredulously. She walked closer to him. "This is obviously proof that what was said in the newspaper was true! You do like me!"

Malfoy laughed. 'An obvious attempt to discredit me and regain her status. She knows just as well as I do that everything the paper said was a lie.' Granger, this isn't about me-it's about you."

"What the hell do you mean, it is so about you!"

"No, it's not." Malfoy said firmly.

"You're making no sense!" said Hermione, frustrated.

"Granger, I hate you."

She gave him a dirty look. "I hate you too. But you kissed me!"

"Yes, I did. And you know why."

"THIS HAS GONE FAR ENOUGH!" Shouted Snape. Everyone stopped talking. Suddenly Snape was back to himself. Hermione backed away from him. "Everyone is dismissed except for you two!"

"I'll MURDER him!" Ron yelled, jumping at Malfoy and knocking him down. Hermione jumped back, for once not bothering to hold Ron back. The bastard deserved it. Harry stood beside her, looking on with satisfaction.

Malfoy looked at him, unfazed.

"Jealous, Weasley? Granger is quite a good kisser, don't you agree? Oh wait, you wouldn't know, now would you?" Malfoy taunted. Ron growled and brought back his fist to punch Malfoy in the face. It never connected. Snape had calmly caught his fist.

"All four of you have detention for 2 weeks," Snape said as he pulled Ron off Malfoy and threw him on the floor.

"Ow!" Ron said as he fell back onto the hard stone floor.

"All four of us?" asked Harry angrily. "What did I do?"

Snape looked at him smugly. "You were breathing."

Harry grumbled under his breath about how much Snape sucked.

"8:00 this Saturday, this room. Leave now or I won't be responsible for my actions."

They all rushed out of the room. Harry and Ron made for the common room, but not before giving Malfoy a look of pure hatred and told him to go do something that, had Snape heard, would have given them 3 extra weeks of detention. Ron cracked his knuckles threateningly but Malfoy merely laughed and strode off, readjusting his tie and hair as he went. Hermione hurried off in the opposite direction without stopping to talk to Harry and Ron or Malfoy.


	12. Perhaps even enjoyable

A/N: Long time, no update, yes, I know. This is sort of blah, but I promise the next chapter will be better. I'm still not quite sure where I'm going with this...I do have ideas, but it's taking a while to figure out how to put it in words. Summer vacation has been since June...something and I graduated high school. Yay college!

* * *

Hermione stalked off towards the library, the place that had always comforted her. This time her visit was not out of sadness, but of anger. She needed a place to calm down. She kept picturing Malfoy's face. So smug, with that annoying smirk of his. Only Malfoy, she decided, could manage to look so pleased with himself after kissing someone he hated so much.

And he had done it to embarrass her-no, to humiliate her. To ruin her, to spoil her name with rumors of a unrequited love. There was no way in hell Hermione would have let him do that. 'So I fought back. There's nothing wrong with that.'

Maybe there was nothing wrong with that, but Hermione did realize that although Malfoy and herself knew the true reason for actions, no one else did..There would be a lot of talk and rumors from now on. They had been rather passionate after all. She blushed, despite herself.

It was all Malfoy's fault. Now she would get questions from her friends, questions she would not be able to answer. 'How could I explain this thing with Malfoy? I don't even know what to call it.' Hermione knew that if she were to explain to Harry and Ron what was going on, Ron would beat Malfoy up. It wasn't as if the idea of Malfoy's face broken wasn't appealing. It was that Hermione wanted revenge. And she wanted to do it on her own. She would settle this thing with Malfoy, show him that she was, in fact, better than him. She, a mere "mudblood" in his eyes, would best him. And then she would watch him fall.

With those thoughts running through her head, she began to relax. Malfoy would get it, and for now she could rest. Hermione sat down at her favorite table, near the back where she always was able to read in peace. She picked out her favorite book, Hogwarts, A History, and began to read. Reading had always been escape, where she could lose herself in the words and forget about her problems, if only for a little while. And for that moment, Hermione forgot all about Malfoy and her plans of revenge.

* * *

Malfoy strolled down the corridors arrogantly, making sure to shove all the tiny first years that passed him, just because he could.

A little Hufflepuff girl started to cry when he shoved her. "You're such a baby, Jones! All you HufflePuffs make me sick! You guys suck! Slytherin rocks," said an equally tiny Slytherin first year. Malfoy gave him an appraising look at him as he passed.

He had just made out with one of his most hated enemies. Hermione Granger was slowly becoming number 1 on the list of people he hated the most.

And he had loved it.

No, he wasn't romantically attracted to her-he couldn't stand her..He hated her. She wasn't attractive. Her hair was so bushy it probably couldn't be brushed at all. Her eyes were too big and a boring dull brown color. Her body-of course he didn't look at her body, what body, she doesn't have...

Malfoy shook his head as if to clear it of dangerous thoughts

He loved the way she looked at him just before he had kissed her for the first time. She thought she was so tough, but he detected a bit of nervousness, a bit of fear. He loved seeing past her know-it-all attitude. He loved the fact that he scared her a little. It made him feel powerful. He loved the way she had attacked him back, but it was all in vain for he was the one who won in the end. He loved everything about it-except the person who the lips belonged to. 'Mudblood Granger. I better go wash my mouth out later. For now, I want to savor the taste of victory.'

'Take that, Granger!' Oh, she thought she was so smart, but he showed her in the end.

He did realize that his fellow Slytherins would have questions, and he didn't know how he would answer them. 'What should I say, "Oh, I just kissed my worst enemy several times because I wanted to humiliate her, I quite enjoyed the feeling because she was so nervous and I like making her mask of perfection slip, I don't regret a thing and I'd do it again just to make her angry? Who would believe that? Though it is the truth...'

Wait. He was the prince of Slytherin. He didn't have to answer to anyone.

Malfoy smiled at this thought, and shoved a second year Ravenclaw just as he approached the Slytherin Common room.


	13. Confrontations

"DRACO!"

Malfoy didn't wince like he usually did at the sound of Pansy's Banshee-like screech. He was expecting it. But it sounded even worse than usual because she poured all her anger out when she yelled like that. That, Malfoy mused, was one of the things that made Pansy so undesirable.

He looked around. Luckily for him, the common room was empty except for the creature standing before him. Pansy's hair, usually neat, was all over the place. Her shirt was wrinkled and there were mascara streaks on her cheeks-she had obviously been crying.

That, Draco thought while looking at her, was another thing that made Pansy so undesirable.

"Well? Don't you have anything to _say _to me?" asked Pansy, her nostrils flaring in a sort of gross way. Her eyes burned into him.

Malfoy smirked at her. "Rinse your face off."

Pansy's mouth fell open in shock.

"And close your mouth."

Pansy snapped. "HOW DARE YOU KISS THAT-THAT-MUDBLOOD! YES, YOU KISSED HER FIRST, I SAW YOU! THEN SHE KISSED YOU BACK, AND THEN YOU KISSED HER AGAIN," she raged, stomping around and waving her hands wildly.

"Your powers of observation astound me, Parkinson," said Malfoy cooly, stepping past Pansy to sit down on the couch.

"I MEAN, I _AM _YOUR GIRLFRIEND!"

"Unfortunately, you are, Pansy _dearest_."

"Well?" Pansy asked, calming down a bit.

"Well, what?" said Malfoy, feeling a bit annoyed now. Pansy's reaction was amusing for awhile, but he now had a headache.

She glared at him. "Well, why did you do it?"

He didn't really have to answer her, and Pansy knew it. She was beneath him. The entire house of Slytherin was beneath him. Malfoy considered the question for a moment.

"Revenge is sweet, _dearest_. And sometimes it may be quite enjoyable-don't you think?"

"Um...yes?" Pansy said, uncertainly.

"Yes. Now, I need to rest. Don't bother coming up to "talk" to me-you do remember what happened last time?" Malfoy said casually. Pansy flinched.

"Yes Draco," Pansy muttered. Malfoy patted her on the shoulder and pushed past her. Pansy was furious.

"OH, YOU CAN KISS THE MUDBLOOD, BUT WHAT DO I GET? A PAT ON THE SHOULDER! WHAT THE HELL IS THAT? I-I DON'T KNOW WHAT TO THINK ANYMORE!" Pansy shrieked. Malfoy did wince this time.

"Don't think at all, Parkinson! You might hurt yourself. You do remember what happened last time?"

"What? What happened last time?" said Pansy, confused.

"_Exactly._"

He left the common room and headed up the stairs without another word to Pansy. Pansy stood in the middle of the empty common room trying to figure out what just happened.

It would take awhile.

* * *

Hermione stopped reading and checked her watch. It was early in the evening. 'Time to put my plan into motion'. Hermione would need Harry's map to begin. But how to get it without meeting her friends along the way?

She didn't want to face her friends. Not now, when her mind was a mess. Surely after her goal was reached the Malfoy thing would be easier to explain. 'I'll just have to avoid them all on the way to the Common Room. With a bit of luck, I'll be able to do this'. Most of the students were in the Great Hall. She would have a better chance now. Hermione gathered up her stuff quickly and set off at a run.

Luckily for her the only people she encountered were a couple of first years. A Slytherin boy was picking on a HufflePuff girl, and she was crying. Normally Hermione would have stopped to help the girl, but she had no time.

"15 points from Slytherin and leave her alone," Hermione yelled at the boy as she ran past. She caught a glimpse of the boy's scowling face before she turned the corner.

Skidding to a stop in front of the Fat Lady, she muttered the password she got from Ron the day before. To her great relief, the common room was deserted. Hermione climbed the stairs leading to the boy's dormitory carefully. It was also empty. Hermione smiled and walked in.

The dormitory was a complete mess. 'Just like boys to have a room like this' she thought. Candy wrappers were all over Ron's bed-apparently he found a new source for his muggle candy. A potted plant was on the floor near Neville's bed. She approached it and it snapped at her fingers. And under Harry's bed was- the marauder's map.

"Yes!" said Hermione, scooping up the map and grinning. 'Let's see...oh good, the girl's dormitory. Hermione left the room and went up to her old room.

hr /hr

"Hello, ladies," said Hermione. "Fancy seeing you here."

It was Lavender and Parvati. She hadn't seen them since they put out their Spy Girlz newspaper. Parvati looked up from the Teen Witch magazine she had been reading and gasped.

"**Hermione! **Um, Lavender- it's Hermione, she's here." Lavender dropped the bottle of nail polish she had been holding. It spilled all over her skirt, but she didn't seem to notice.

"**Ahh!** It's Hermione! Oh no!" Lavender yelled. Parvati glared at her.

"You forgot the disillusionment charms, didn't you?" Lavender looked down.

"Yeah..."

"And the glamours?"

"Yeah..."

"The cloaking spells?"

"Yes, dammit, all of them!" Hermione laughed.

"All that for me? How sweet" she said, walking towards the two cowering girls.

"Hermione, please don't hurt me. I have a date with Seamus this coming Saturday! Take-take...Parvati! Yeah, take her instead!" Said Lavender, gesturing frantically to Parvati, who smacked her promptly.

"You traitor! I'll have you know I'm not against using you as a human shield!" Parvati hissed. Hermione just smiled.

"Although it would be amusing to see Lavender used as a shield, I'm not going to hurt you guys," said Hermione sweetly. The girls sighed in relief.

"Oh thank you Hermione, I hoped you would see it our way-freedom of the press, you know" said Parvati earnestly. Lavender nodded.

"We were really afraid you'd come to get some kind of revenge, I mean, you aren't called the smartest witch at Hogwarts for nothing!"

"Yeah, we've been given permission in our classes to hide. So we're there, but you just can't see us. The things we put up with for the truth," said Lavender dramatically. "Professor Snape was kind of nice about our...situation, actually. I think he liked our paper," she added.

"Yes, for all our efforts to bring interesting news to Hogwarts-I mean this is what we get!" cried Parvati. Lavender nodded again..

"I know! So totally unfair!" said Lavender.

"I mean, we're sneaking around like cowards because of this!" Parvati said. Clearly this annoyed her greatly.

"Do tell me who you are hiding from," Hermione interrupted smoothly.

They glanced at each other. "Well," said Lavender reluctantly, "Draco Malfoy-" (They sighed at his most _wonderful _name).

"Ron Weasley."

"Ginny Weasley."

"...You"

"Lauren Gerud-she thinks we're stalking her"

"Half the Slytherin girls..."

"Dean Thomas"

Parvati narrowed her eyes at that one. "Oh please Lavender! You aren't hiding from him. You're throwing yourself at him! Don't think I didn't see you yesterday!" Lavender sniffed. "You're just jealous."

"**Anyway**," Hermione cut in, "There's something I need you both to do for me."

"Yes?" said Lavender.

" Before I ask for a favor, close your eyes."

"Okayyy..." Hermione whipped out her wand and muttered a spell.

"Open your eyes." They did.

"AHHHHHHHH!" Lavender shouted, staring at her arms.

"EEEEEKKKK!" Parvati screamed, looking in the mirror.

"But Parvati, said Hermione innocently, "I thought you liked pink. And Lavender, obviously purple's your favorite color."

"But not on us!" they sobbed, staring at each other.

Hermione had turned Parvati's skin a hot pink color, and Lavender a deep purple. 'Payback time!'. "That's for giving Malfoy a reason to kiss me, and for embarrassing me and my friends. Don't worry, it will only last for a week. I think. Maybe more. I hope Seamus likes purple."

Lavender rushed forward to attack Hermione. "You little- Purple clashes with my hair! And how DARE you mess with my beautiful smooth skin-which is way more beautiful than Parvati's, by the way. "

"Is not." Parvati said crossly.

Before Lavender reached her, she had her wand out and muttered another spell that turned Lavender's hair green.

"AHHHHH!" Lavender screamed. "My beautiful hair!" Hermione whispered another spell. Lavender's nails turned orange.

"AHHHHHH!" Lavender screamed. "My beautiful nails!" Hermione turned Lavender's ears bright yellow.

"AHHhhh...I'm tired of screaming."

"Does anyone _else _want to try to attack me?" asked Hermione, savoring her victory.

"No, Hermione!" said Parvati quickly, backing away

"Hey, I thought you said you wouldn't hurt us!"said Lavender, glaring at her.

"Are you lying on the floor bleeding?"

"No..."

"Then I didn't hurt you."

"You're quite scary, you know."

"Thank you. And now, I need your help with something." Lavender snorted.

"Like I'm going to..." Parvati slapped her.

"Of course Hermione, what is it you need?" Parvati said nervously, while shooting annoyed looks at Lavender.

"Well..."

* * *

(A/N): I would like to thank harmless platonic relations... for motivating me to update this story. And also for me to plan this all out, at least I know where this is going now, lol. So thanks for all the reviews everyone, and review this chapter if you can.


	14. Explanations and Ballet Ninjas

The next morning Hermione was silent as she ate breakfast. She was deep in thought, though she knew in a bit there was going to be an explosion. She hadn't seen Harry or Ron since the day her and Malfoy kissed. Ron's temper was sure to come out. At the moment, though, they seemed to ignore it.

"Hey Hermione, D'you think you could help me out later with that essay from Snape, I'm having some trouble with the conclusion," said Ron, looking at her hopefully. Hermione mumbled a reply. "Uh, is that a yes or a no?" Ron asked, confused.

"Hermione, will you come to watch us practice tonight?" asked Harry. "We'd really like you to be there." Hermione didn't respond. Ron waved a hand in front of her face. She didn't respond, but kept eating.

Harry and Ron looked at each other. "Bet you 3 sickles that I can get her to wake up," Ron said, grinning. Harry smiled. "You're on!"

"Guess what Hermione? I haven't done any homework at all this week," said Ron loudly.

"Yeah, well I haven't done any homework at all this past _month_," said Harry louder.

"Well I haven't done any of my homework at all this past month AND I've been copying it all from Dean" said Ron, even louder than Harry.

"No, you haven't!" said Dean, turning around and glaring at Ron.

"How would you even know, Dean? I could be copying it from you and you wouldn't even notice" Dean rolled his eyes.

"Yeah right Ron, like that's even possible." Ron sniffed.

"Say what you like, but you just don't know about my master skills."

"Yeah? What kind of skills? Candy skills?"

Ron turned red. "No! My skills in. . . . as a ballet ninja."

"A ballet ninja." Dean repeated.

Ron nodded."With the grace of a ballerina and the violence of a ninja, I've got it all, "Ron said proudly.

The table became quiet at the sound of Ron's proclamation.

"What? You guys are _so_ jealous. Not everyone can be a ballet ninja, you know."

They stared.

"Ron, did you eat any candy this morning, because you're acting weird. More than normal," said Harry, looking at him carefully.

"NO of course not!" Ron shook his head. "Honestly Harry and Co., you always think the worst of me. I'm hurt. I really am." Ron said, giving them all his puppy-dog eyes. There was a chorus of "ugh!" across the table. Harry frowned. "I still don't believe you," he said, running his hand through his untidy black hair. A girl at the Ravenclaw table swooned at the sight, but Harry took no notice.

"I'm tellin' you 'arry, I haven't got a secret source of muggle candy that you don' know abou'!", Ron said through a mouthful of oatmeal, whilst shaking his spoon at him in a mildly threatening manner. The oatmeal splattered on Harry's glasses.

"HEY!"

"Honestly, you two are such idiots," said Ginny, rolling her eyes. Ginny had been watching them all from her seat next to Dean (who was distracted by Ron's evil glares). " But very entertaining idiots," she mused. She turned abruptly toward Hermione. "Hermione, Professor Snape asked me to tell you that your last essay received a T and you now have detention with him tomorrow at 8:00."

That got Hermione's attention.

"WHAT!" she shouted, snapping out of it. Ginny smiled.

"You two owe me . . . 6 sickles for my trouble," she said triumphantly. Grumbling, they handed over their money. Hermione's eyes narrowed as she looked at them. "You bet on me!" Ron shrugged.

"Yeah, so what if we did?" Ron challenged. Just as Hermione was about to answer, Harry cut her off.

"Never mind that! Hermione, we need to talk." Hermione frowned, but didn't reply.

"Oh yeah Hermione, I completely forgot, we need to talk," Ron said earnestly. She looked at both of them who were staring up at her."Fine," she said after awhile. Harry cleared his throat. "Why di-"

"YEAH HERMIONE, WHAT'S UP WITH YOU AND THE SECOND MAJOR GIT IN THE SCHOOL???" Ron shouted.

"Second major git?" Harry asked, smiling a little.

"Well, of course Snape is the first, you kno- DON'T DISTRACT ME, I AM TRYING TO DISCUSS THE SITUATION WITH HERMIONE IN A MATURE WAY!"

Hermione scowled at him. "Ronald, I refuse to talk to you if you shout at me."

"FINE, THEN I REFUSE TO TALK TO YOU!" Ron shouted. Then he grinned at Harry. "You see? I told you I could handle this. I've totally got it down. Way better than you." Harry rolled his eyes. "You sure told her, Ron. Continue eating." he said. Ron took his advice, digging into his plate of food.

"Okay Hermione, why did you do it? Why did you kiss Malfoy back? Why did he kiss you in the first place?" Hermione sighed. "The situation is complicated, Harry. I don't know if I can explain it." Harry nodded. "Just tell me one thing: Do you like him?" "No, absolutely not, "she said, glancing at the Slytherin table. Malfoy was currently in a heated discussion with some girl. She could see him gesturing with his hands . . .

"How dare you imply such things?!" Malfoy hissed at a dark-haired girl, getting in her face. She shrank back and averted her eyes. Malfoy was surprised and annoyed at the girl's boldness. She had just asked him, or really _demanded _that he tell her "Why'd you kiss that awful Granger girl? Are you in love with her or something?". "How dare you question me?" Malfoy practically shouted at her. "Who do you think you are?"

"M-Martina Davis?" she said tentatively. He rolled his eyes.

"Aren't you that girl that was in that rag _Spy Girlz_?" He asked, referring to that small interview she had. He took a closer look at the girl. She was shaking. 'Serves her right.' He thought.

"Uh . . . yeah."

He snorted. 'Another jealous fan'. Malfoy had already encountered 3 other girls who were distraught over his "consorting with a Gryffindor." The last one was rather big and scary looking; he hadn't waited for her to finish before he ran down the corridor. Luckily, no one had seen his act of cowardice. He did have his good looks to think about, after all.

He found that with a bit of yelling and dirty looks they fell silent and scampered away. But Martina seemed to be different. He realized that she was still rambling on.

". . . and well I know with your high status going around with Granger will bring your popularity down, and also she's a disgusting mudblood with a freakishly high IQ. I can't imagine why you would dump her for Pansy, I mean, isn't Pansy prettier than her? I don't think girls mind so much that you're with Pansy, but that Hermione Granger? Friends with Potter and that ugly Weasley? If I hadn't heard about the . . . _incident _from Laurie, who heard it from Francis, who heard it Lucille, who heard it from both Anna and Sarah, who-"

"Shut. Your. Mouth. NOW!" Malfoy growled at Martina, who instantly stopped talking and cowered again. 'This girl needs to make up her mind. Is she scared of me or not?' he thought, frustrated that his intimidation techniques were failing.

"Martina! Think about who you are talking to!" whispered one of her friends sitting next to her. Martina paled. "I-um, I apologize, Draco. I'm sorry."

"Damn right you are, girl," Malfoy muttered. Just then the door to the Great Hall opened.

"Draco! Don't think I didn't know that you insulted me yesterday!" said Pansy, rushing into the hall. She stood next to him, her arms crossed and her eyes narrowed. Malfoy looked at her. "Bravo Parkinson. It only took you 24 hours to realize that. That's a record! Took you 3 days last time." She sniffed.

"So that's what you think? That I'm _slow_, then?" She asked, taking the space across from him. She glared. He was about to answer her when something hit him in the face. It was a white owl, not his own black one. Tearing the owl off his face and throwing it in Pansy's, he grabbed the paper that was attached to the owl's leg. He noticed that everyone seemed to have a paper like him. He took a closer look at it.

It was purple.

And Granger was smirking at him.

A/N College Girl now, have off the entire month of January and I said, hey I could update. Sorry nothing really happened this chapter . . . next chapter will be better when I get around to it.

Please Review!

Slim Shady


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